ASSUMING THE SNAKE

Acquainted with leathery coils
and tune-less scales,
mirrors steamed in the bruise
of settled blood,
it's easy to assume
a trail of slithering snakes,
let the desert just be
in the sand.
The sculpture unfinished
and soft.
Easy to refrain
from lifting the rock,
disturbing the soil,
from planting .
untrustable tulip bulbs,
from taking the burlap
off of the roots.

Trained by
the glare of the dark,
it's easy to let the puppet
of hope fall between
the gaping cracks.
To lump all men
into the jagged
and dangerous reef,
consider the shark
the meat of the sea.
Be certain that stars
wear garlands of thoms.
To hat the head,
love the closet for the door.
To pitch an iffy diaphragm,
masturbate like violins.
Keep fingers
in condoms of gloves.
Consider the moon
a leper in white

THE PORRIDGE CLOUD

The porridge cloud, the pacing choir.
Depression for breakfast and lunch.
Then supper and night
the cruel rewinding of tapes.
Bodies of dead cats swim on the road.
How many lives can we waste?
I'm itching to leave,
to follow your cheating path.
Is shipwreck one word or two?
Am 1 alone, or one of a flock,
a tiny scar, a wrinkled mushroom
leaning against the plain brown hill.
If you had been here,
whole as a perfect pear,
would your juice
have sugared my grief?

My fingers sit on a touch tone phone
longing to stitch the grueling
space of states away
in institutions for the old.
Where your fat grows like a bruise,
where little pills turn
poignancy to baby talk.
The dwarfed hour is haunting us.
The sun will become the mustard seed.
My legs squeak as they move.
Will you meet me
in the middle of the sound?
I've needed a portrait
to show to the mirror.
Hands wear splinters
from the brazen square
of a vacant frame.

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