PRODIGY

I've heard it 

so often, I believe 

without blinking:

how all of time 

and space 

have converged 

to make 

just the tiniest 

crescent-shaped edge 

of my brittle 

and milky-white left

pinky finger nail. 

But it makes me 

so nervous, I could chew it 

to shreds

when I apprehend these

minuscule melodies 

in me

without having seized 

on the artistry 

to see 

whose subtle fingers 

may yet swiftly 

descend 

and depress 

the right keys 

to release them.

POETRY COMPETITION

We're now playing 

a roulette game 

with the iffiness 

of language.

This next bit

may devastate—

or else 

sniff you 

a few times and 

leave you alone. 

His verses her 

ill-defined interpretation 

conjures "full-body transformation"

clichéd before-and-

after shots. 

Answers are little 

but combs 

which are hollow 

of the honey 

known as satisfaction—

and yet,

pleasure still arises 

in our failure 

to choose 

between either side

of the paradox.

FAULTLESS

Some things are so right 

that they just aren't 

taught—

some commandments, so innate, 

there's no need 

to hand them down.

Such unique breeds of fact

are twisted up tight 

and borne along inside 

like tiny strands 

of DNA;

they may wait years, 

or even decades

to unfurl their truth 

and replicate 

while you sleep—

and dream 

of a scene, almost deathlike, 

in which even the motes 

of dust are frozen 

in a narrow beam of light 

from a source 

you can't name—

and then wake 

to the littlest nag 

of an ache 

which, you now know,

will one day balloon

to a pain 

so great

that, at long last, it

exonerates your life. 

DATA

It may sound slick

and advantageous, 

but I assure you, 

it's a curse to always 

be so right—

might sound like a boon,

but it truly is 

a blight 

to always remain 

so logically congruent 

in the heat of hawkish 

conversation.

If fact,

you probably don't see

how I can do it 

even in the middle 

of a petulant fight—

like that night 

when I could not help 

but intuit, 

after you'd sworn I'd 

grown callous 

and aloof,

that the opposite 

of distance 

isn't closeness;

it's height.

EVEN ODDS

Another fragile 

April sky: thin uniform

of silver—

the kind 

which is both 

luminous and somber,

everywhere 

and nowhere at 

the very same time—

might yet darken 

and descend, cursing 

afternoon with evening,

or crack to wide blue 

and unfurl its 

smiling riches—

depending 

on whether one

very certain word

which is, at this moment, 

being whispered 

down here 

by one wounded person 

to the ear 

of another 

has been willfully filled 

with scalpels 

or stitches.

LITTLE SHOCKS

You've been unsure 

for so long, 

it's turned into 

an addiction—

what will you do 

with these things 

that you feel? 

And you've often trembled

in recognition 

of the voice 

you've been using 

to do all this wondering.

But it might be 

time to begin 

to believe in

this story you've 

been weaving—

to come clean and appreciate 

all the little shocks 

of truth 

which are shot through the morass 

of your neverending fiction.

To observe

which silences 

undergird the fabric 

of each word, 

stitching form 

and emptiness together 

into bodies—

better yet, into names 

which compel their 

passing owners 

to stop short

and gape back 

at you, their most 

reluctant speaker, 

as much in surprise 

as in 

recognition.

BITTER THINGS

After you've been 

on the Earth 

for a while, 

the bitter things 

start to taste better

and better.

Those acrid black coffees 

and astringent 

brown liquors—

which at first 

made you grimace 

and shiver a little—

now taste a lot more 

like the sweet woe 

of knowing 

that, with each passing 

sip, the gnarled 

measuring stick 

with which you tally 

your verve grows more brittle 

and shorter.

By the time you're 85, 

you're burning morning 

toast on purpose,

heaping turmeric 

and dirt on raw 

eggplants for dinner;

such tastes of oblivion 

are more than just 

stirring—

a daily brush 

with the ghastly truth

is all that keeps you going.