samples

1

To know there is a God

I lay, crushed between sky and mesa top, mouth gaping like a carp… open… close… open… close… open. Damp tuff against my back drives the close. Density of sky leaning on my chest pushes the open.

 

A Tangle Down Her Legs
O, big air
O, small death
O, all alone
O, too fast
O, dark
O, bad words
O, invisible snakes
O, left out
O, no stories tonight
O, bad dreams

Tangles burst
into muscle
and sinew
sewing in fear
inescapable
in a gash-second
of terror.

Still new and elastic
she will soon
appear
again untangled,

though scabs
of innocence
are formed
and lost
with each new episode.

 

Son of Man

Water overflows
Magritte’s
upturned bowler
in needles–

hair and bone
pulled
with it
and memory.

It’s all wrong
and yet
outside
the rain
needles down
too–

threading
into the ground
to sew
or sow.