For years I swam
with pockets full
of stones. The cold
water rushed to
accept me. At
the bottom was
another night
& I lived there
for far too long,
pockets sewn shut,
& my lungs wings
of blackest mud.

I broke free, and
drifted up to
the veins of stars
wavering on
the water's skin.
I took the air
& ate it whole.
Poems dropped from
my brown eyes, I
found you, I was
ready. Dreams lay
below spruces,
with coins of sun
we bought tickets
to history.

But will I hear
those stones again?
Singing from the
false night of the
drowning floor? It
keeps me awake
in the lean hours.

You live on the canal,
by the little swan
that whittles the sun.
A sudden rush of clouds,
a clatter of sandals -
caprice of Dublin.

I knew of Dublin
and its grand canal
from old books tan as sandals.
I read Yeats for a swan,
Joyce for castle clouds
that yielded little sun.

But you, you were the sun!
You lit green Dublin
from within. Clouds
fled from the canals
of your eye. "Swansies."
And summer's far sandals

were today's sandals:
time shifted in the sun,
took flight like the night swan
through ancient Dublin.
You sent letters from the canal,
letters that divided clouds,

only to calve new clouds.
I've never worn sandals,
not ever, but when the canal
danced in my dreams, the sun
pierced my foot in Dublin.
You were my swan,

my elegant swansie,
killer of cloud,
conquistador of Dublin
in gladiatorial sandal,
herald and avatar of sun,
romantic of the grand canal.

Let me taste unclouded sun -  
let sandals upend the canal -
send swans by the dozen into Dublin.

On lover's lane
we cancel the rain
with champagne.
On lover's lane
kisses entertain
& endlessly sustain.
On lover's lane
we cancel the rain.

Like burning marshmallow,
the clouds this Monday.
Thumb over the phone
& the words to you pop
& sway like gin pink
with bitters. Lily lady,

O my lily lady,
kiss me marshmallow -
sticky and tinted pink
with lip on a rainy Monday.
Green window pops
arrive on my phone,

this sweet black phone
that brings you, my lady,
over Atlantic's salt pop
& volted marshmallow.
So on this Monday
when the sky draws pink,

& clouds too are toasted pink,
I take this thin phone
and find you. On this Monday,
my Dublin lady,
under a melting marshmallow
sky, I seek out your hot pop,

that flame that's popping
in the twilight, red and pink.
Sweet as marshmallow,
you burn through my phone,
my smiling lily lady,
even on a Monday.

& so this Monday
like a soap bubble pops.
I'm inspired, my lady,
by the silken pink
thing. On your phone,
a swan's wing of marshmallow.

Yes - Monday's poem comes pink,
& pops with phone messages
from my lady, soft as marshmallows.

I laid there
for hours
and listened
to the rain,
unable to
sleep. It
dropped
in mild
lambent
waves all
down the
grass rail
and across
collars of
trees. The
street was
splotched
with wet
shadow.
Eventually,
I knew that
sleep would
not come for
me, I went
out as you
suggested.
The rain
truckled
down my
knee,
behind
my ear.
I felt it
assemble
on my face.
Standing
in the dark
buttons of
the yard,
I put my
hand on a
corner of
life, and
stood in the
water brow.
Clouds sank
like the
shoulders of
frigates.
I went back,
having
annexed
a dream.

I was once
told that I
wasn't afraid
of heights,
but of being
thrown from
them -
& this was
a comfort,
for the flaw
wasn't in me,
per se, but in
my reading
of other people,
my trust in
their intentions.
Even so, any
bridge was
breathing
knives.

Then I met
you, and we
walked over
Taft bridge,
the largest
unreinforced
concrete
structure in
the world,
rising above
Rock Creek
gorge, 128 feet
above the
bright green
floor I feared
until you.

We crossed it
in style. I was
in the angle
of the eagle.
I walked on
the backs of
lions. I held
light. My eye
surveyed the
depths of the
glen. I walked
with you by
my side all
the way to
Dupont,
& when we
shared coffee -
I spoke endlessly
to comfort your
excess of sun -
I felt a swerve
of glory, a sense
of the world
that I only
shared with you.

I was once told that I wasn't
afraid of heights, but of being
thrown from them -
& this was a comfort, for
the flaw wasn't in me, per se,
but in my reading of other
people, my trust in their
intentions. Even so, crossing
any bridge was breathing knives.

Then I met you, and we walked
over Taft bridge, the largest
unreinforced concrete structure
in the world, rising above
Rock Creek gorge, 128 feet
above the bright green floor
I feared until you.

We crossed it in style. I was
in the angle of the eagle.
I walked on the backs of lions.
I held light. My eye surveyed
the depths of the glen.
I walked with you by my side
all the way to Dupont,
& when we shared coffee -
I spoke endlessly to comfort
your excess of sun -
I felt a swerve of glory, a sense
of the world that I only shared
with you.

Evening yellow,
sun purple plum.
I'm grieving your
absence under
sheet cloud.
Trumpets of night
are moaning,
tomorrow molten.
Kansas Avenue
collapsed into the
center of the earth,
but it's alright.
Here is the Bible
Study school, here
a slip of children,
here is the parish
of weeds binding
corner green.
Everything seems
assembled for you:
you've changed me.

Turn the cup
& read the grounds...
Finish up,
turn the cup -
is it the black pup,
that I've found?
Turn the cup
& read the grounds...

I'm a few feet
under the city,
in the cemetery
of the streetcars.
Images celebrating
Stonewall convex
from projectors onto
chilled chamber
of gypsum cement.

I'm here for yoga,
an absolute beginner
with my purple mat,
taking off my shoes
and feeling the rough
floor where the
streetcars were
severed from their
electric milk.
The hour of my
longest spine
is saturated, voices
fed only to me.
My hands slip...
My bones are
symphony.

When the hour's done
I have a new face of salt.
I fold my street of
discovery and shake
the stairs. I climb out
to supermassive clouds,
I feel my shape move,
I'm grateful for you.

i.
The sky grinds
under my heel
& scatters.

When the pool
stills, there's only
your face.

ii.
Below
larch branch,
below
cloud mark -
your words
echo
in my
blue thought.

iii.
Centuries ago
I wrote to you
"je suys vostre
sans de partier."

iv.
Sleep falls
to the floor,
its strings cut
by your hand
running over
my face.

v.
We move
shadow to
shadow in
this maze
of sun.

vi.
We hold hands
as night folds
& folds. Your
hand is soft
as song.

vii.
We make
love under
a coil, a
swan's moon,
a sea disc.

viii.
Autumn
in Paris,
streets paved
orange and red,
& my eyes saying
"want you."

ix.
You know what
champagne does
to me, but you
pour it anyway.

x.
"She was hiding
in lemon leaves
& apple blossoms."
-Abdul Wahab Al-Bayati,
Love Under The Rain, IX

xi.
The rain
in Dublin
makes me
think of
your wet hair
shining in
the doorway.

xii.
I get up early
to start the coffee.
You wake to
the sound of
water boiling.
When I appear
I bring morning
on my lips.

xiii.
Please draw
while I watch
in awe.
Please draw
as ice thaws
in my scotch.
Please draw
while I watch.

xiv.
I'll remove
the paper

butterflies
from your

ears as
you fall

asleep on
the couch,

little dove
in her nest.

xv.
I poach two eggs
for your breakfast,
with quince
& pear. The sun
journeys to us
from yesterday.
The cat's in the
window and
coffee steeps.
Perhaps this
is what lives
are made of.

xvi.
The image
of the nape
of your neck
as you watch
a movie late
on a cold night
full of snow thick
as dough, licked
with wind -
it's irresistible.

xvii.
We're in the
Rothko room at
the National Gallery,
translating white
square, blue band,
yellow over yellow,
black into black.
We move a little
closer together
as the canvases
mirror our
yearning.

xviii.
I read about
old Sumerian
gods, like
Inanna.
She could
never survive
in a world
where you
walk the earth.

xix.
Doing yoga in a
cement chamber
under the city,
muscles shaking.
Grateful for you
amid the ghosts
of streetcars.

**.
We bury time
in a plastic
sarcophagus
right in the
front yard,
casual as
a yam.

xxi.
Ulysses
and you,
the cork
and bottle.

"And then he asked
me would I yes."

xxii.
The smoke
cures the
whiskey.

The whiskey
spills
like tide.

The tongue's
tide seeks
your ear.

The ear
hunts
your thought.

The thought
wafts
like smoke.

xxiii.
Blood peel,
ginger
cumulus,
pink air
like chiffon,
a gloaming
song.

xxiv.
Swans mate
for life.
This wait
is a knife.
Dull rain
over K.
In my veins,
your sleighs.

xxv.
Silver thread
knotted cloud -
the moon's
broadcasting
through the
cindered air.
Your raw sienna
eye captures mine,
& in one moment
the entire night
is abandoned
to your arms.

xxvi.
The twilight
is imperial,
spreading
over that
moment
between
our past
& our future.

xxvii.
I still see you,
brush in hand,
red curving.
You seduced
with every line.

xxviii.
You breathe
life into my
world: the
field of wild
mint, the owls
in the cemetery,
the silver slash
of streetlamp,
the cream Impala.
Everything I see
is filled with us.

xxix.
You're the beat
within my chest.
I feel complete,
you're the beat
throbbing sweet
& I'm blessed -
you're the beat
within my chest.

Watch the wild swans
that glide the pool.
In the blooming dawn
watch the wild swans
spread wing until gone -
A white thread unspools.
Watch the wild swans
that glide the pool.

Let's spend Fall
in Paris and Rome
while all the stars loll.
Let us spend Fall
in old marble halls
below painted domes.
Let us spend Fall
in Paris and Rome.

You fill the world
with secret meaning -

for example,
these small wisps,

these puffballs
that meadow to

dandelions,
Once they carried

my wishes.
They would scatter

on their strange
sails and raise

the yellow brightest.
But then,

you and I
we watched Amarcord

where puffball
swing seasons

into town,
salt a wedding,

mark the limits
of memory,

of childhood.
Now I see them,

gracing across
the fields

& yards
& I think

automatically
of you.

We were the shining ones.
Our bottles never broke,
coffee was always at
full steam. My perfect
memory pulled at the
hair of time. Your wrist
tattoo sighed in the sheets.
The bed ached. The sun
was a press. We were the
shining ones, to be sure.

But then you were called
back to the green. I watched
your plane. I dropped throbs.
My heart was broken harp
strings. There was fever
crying in my hands.

But you will be back.
You'll cross the hems of
the world. I'll hold you
again in the sweet of
the night. You'll draw me.
Your paintings will sing
Hallelujahs from the walls.
The moon will moan glory
from its lonely sconce.
We'll be flooded
with reunion.

The carousel
of your voice...
It lifts me all
the way home.

My hands ache
with emptiness,
they are so used
to holding yours.

I hear our music,
set to the drum
of the rain. These
are the lyrics.

I am forever
fifteen with you,
I am under a spell,
I use sails of night

to come reach you
in dreams. You are
a gift. For you,
I poach eggs.

In this odd world
of valentines and
pine cones, you
are the heart of me.

Drunk because
you're not here.
Gin and *****
drop into glass.

Drunk because
I don't know how
to tell you I want
to make you mine.

Drunk because
creme de violette
speaks purple
for both of us.

Drunk because
the Casino soothes
me with maraschino -
so let's go to Rome.

Drunk because
you left me that
pink silk thing.
It haunts me.

Drunk because
you're not here.
Gin and *****
drop into glass.

Oksana said
"Love is not linear,"
and she was right.
It rises and it dips,
O how it dips...

Ebb and recede,
the quiet moments
vanish between
stars, doubt settles
in the ribs, thoughts
drift and drift away.

But trust in me:
anxiety and sorrow
cannot shake me
from your side;
just as I lean
to you in my own
times of worry.

Hold my hand,
and don't let go.
Heart's demand,
hold my hand,
something grand,
sweet hello.
Hold my hand,
and don't let go.

Sunset sloe,
candle sway,
cloud slip.
Night wants,
hush wish,
wedding will.
Paint away,
bedding bow,
arching hip.
Steam haunt,
gin dish,
hazel trill.
Irish love,
endless dove.

Let me warn you,
this poem says
                           nothing.

A half-inch of snow
fell in the yard?
I'm compelled
to record it here
for reasons unknown
even to myself.

The clouds are dark
and frothing?
That's nothing new.

What do rough
cumulus lips
mouth in the
upper distance?
Look up, peer
as snow-hills
melt into self-loathing.

By the way,
this poem merely
turned skyward,
it still says
                   nothing.

Apple trees
bow silently,
& meadows
burn evening
green. You
strolled out
of a dream
into my life.
Paintings wait
for your eye.
Bricks wait
for your feet.
The city desires
what I desire -
that you come,
& live with me.
The swansies
have had you
long enough -
let me have my
turn. I've placed
a bookmark in
my life, turned
down the corner
of the page.
I walk the same
circles, past the
same apple trees,
the same meadows,
but I'm only
half in it.

Drunk in the Hirschhorn garden,
it seems  the sculptures rise
and take to air, bronze on bronze.
Swear as sweat drops in the corner
of the eye, squint against mounting glint
of the polished windows that gaze
so blankly over the glossy green estate.
Drunk again at noon, and hardened
by hurt against the friend who surprises
with criticism: she must realize it spawns
first inside the soul? First mourner
at my living funeral. O Jennie, swimming
through the garden with your cotton grace,
tolerate my dazed smile, amid the statuary.

I miss you, dear sweet,
deep in my bones.
In the high city heat
I miss you, dear sweet.
May the hours retreat
when the wild wind moans -
I miss you, dear sweet,
deep in my bones.

You are somewhere between
the track of my gaze and
Dublin's last days,
long with summer
& brittle breeze,
& fickle cloud
that denies a sun.

You are something between
a Daydream Delusion
& the poems I write that
speak your name with
every vocabulary.
"Limousine eyelash."
You are still here, and
you always will be.

The art of
blacking
the teeth -

The kettled
smile, coalish,
wet with steam.

The lacquer's
taste, like the
spaces between
the night grass.

The beauty of
the dyed mouth,
& the kisses that
reach from the
bottom of black
envelopes of sea

Sword lilies
play in the noon.
The spending sun
is a yellow wild.
We drink champagne
for the hell of it,
because and
because.

I carry you
with twining
laughter to
the bedroom.
The sloping thigh
of night, under
a palm moon.

You nestle into the
crook of my arm,
movies play out in
green breath foam.
We drink
paper planes.

We drink gin, too.
The squares of London
skirt your legs
as we dream
with lavender.

You annihilate
with your merest
gesture as we turn
Turkish vinyl.

Cursive stars are
scrawled with
new romance.

We drink champagne
for the hell of it,

because and because.

A ceremony
of sun in the

admitted eye.
The day drawing

away silently.
You, tempting

me with the
inviting

curve of
your cheek...

The future is ours,
and life is sweet.
Through all the hours
the future is ours,
and all our powers
grow great in May heat...
the future is ours,
and life is sweet.

As you speak Turkish
to your sleeping hand
the sun raises pink
frequencies in
tremendous arches
through radioactive
lozenge clouds.
I adore you
helplessly as we
split circles of grace.
Citrus banners
break in the distance.
The lawn is forever.

This is our
first meeting.
In the impossible
whiteness of
the airport, you
appeared in my
arms, six hundred
pages of waiting
come blinking
to life. I have
discovered I cannot
ever kiss you
enough - the
fallow hush
of sky urges me
to drink you.

So I do.
My life opens
for you, deep
green slices.
You are the
same, and
this is our way.
Words silver
the citizen air.
Heat drips
down our
backs. Hearts
are crisp with
truth.

The sun
pulled your
plane across
the petals
of sea.
On afternoon's
blossom
you're here,
two months
of waiting
fulfilled
by two silver
lines.

Come,
and be my
Renaissance -
share the gift
of your mind
over a cup
of strong coffee,
and talk,
just talk.

Be with me, love,
tomorrow's our day.
Like hand in glove
be with me, love.
My little dove,
my lily bouquet -
be with me, love,
tomorrow's our day

i.
Your names
are a sudden
throb on
the tongue.

ii.
Your names
are a beachhead,
and the splitting
tide across it.

iii.
Your names
are diaries,
secret days
of ash and ink.

iv.
Your names
are the green
vocabularies
of the branches.

v.
Your names
are a shock
of gin in the
back of the throat.

vi.
Your names
are vespertine,
a soft song
in the evening.

vii.
Your names
are a corsage
of ether around
the wrist.

viii.
Your names
are an antidote
to the long,
long day.

ix.
Your names
are dreams,
mirages that
divide and rise.

x.
Your names
are the dark
brick fork
in my lane.

You're in hell,
a fractioned
ghost, eating
clay and dust.
You suppose
time moves
in this abyss
but there's no
way to be sure.

Then:
a scream
at the gates
like all the
winds that
scrape at
the heart.
& it doesn't
take long
before the screams
resolve to a name:
Ishtar is here.

She of ***, war,
& the moon, all
of them long
absent in
this place.
She wants in,
to rule this
forsaken empire,
to take it from
her older sister,
to conquer
one more thing.

She fails,
of course.
Her sister
tricks her,
leaves her
naked,
without her
powers,
after the
final gate.
Ishtar howls,
and leaves
to eat men
like easy grain.

But imagine
that brief
moment,
when you
think that
maybe, just
maybe, you'd
see the organza
ball of moon
again, that
you and the one
next to you
might embrace
in shaded lust,
engender
a new empire
in the dark,
& overthrow it all.

Hold on to
your hope:
Ishtar has
never been
patient.

Here, under a
dead dream,
slurred men
coagulate under
a chord of cloud
that late was
lanced by stone.

Their tongues
cluck with new
noise. Anxious
alphabets rise
in the dust.

Was the tower
a plea? A yearning
to return to God?
Or something
defiant, an arm
extended in theft?

The division of
language is
the birth of
the shibboleth.

Save me,
she writes.
Take me
from here,
everyone is
dead, even
I feel dead.

She reads
his messages
in the dark.
"I'll come
for you,
I promise."

She climbs
for hours,
in the castle
of bone.

"But what
do you look
like?" he asks.
Her heart
turns to water
in her chest.
"Show me,
show me
everything."

She's not surprised,
just disappointed.
She turns away
& steps back into
the black lane.

Another Orpheus
fails the test.

She reminds me
of old, painful
geometries.

Her close-grained
rasp and enchanted,
pierced warble -
a close kiss
& a hammer.

"Some days
all you need
is one good
thought, strong
in your mind."

Her voice
is Orpheus,
looking back,
is Ophelia,
on the willow
branch.

It shakes
dullness from
the soul, the
way you clean
a coin
with salt.

Tonight
the Potomac
strokes the
wing of the
Chesapeake.
Washington
turns on the
lights, goes out
to dinner, catches
up on television.

But in four days
you'll arrive to
break all of it,
& build it again
in your image.

From that frozen
moment in the
terminal - like
an eclipse -
we will count
all the petals
in an eye,
all the clouds
in a hand.

The left-hand
shadow of
the ocean
curdles in
the small of
the back,
& legs ache
down dune
lanes, dawn-
marbled
sand squares,
pine-pitted,
while lungs rub
the court of ribs.

I'm looking
for anything
that resembles
a memory
of my father.

Salting sun,
mezcal splash,
spiced crab -
hints of him
here and there.

I carry him
in a cradle
of tattoos
across my
arms but
it's not
the same.

So I run
the beaches,
recalling
the time we
stopped at
a flooded
road on the
way into
the city and
Dad thought
for five solid
minutes about
whether we might
make it across
the dark water.

Youth

A scent like a sword forged with the acid
of plums found by a road,
the sugary kisses that linger in the teeth,
the drops of life sprinkling on the fingertips,
the sweet ****** heart,
the yards, the haystacks, the inviting
secret rooms in the vast houses,
mattresses sleeping in the past, the raging green valley
seen from above, from a hidden window:
adolescence all flickering and burning
like a lamp knocked over in the rain.

-Pablo Neruda,
translated by Evan Stephens ~1999

I'm watching
a day rain
that moves
so immensely -  
heaven's wet
mile, spans
& masses
of gray.

It can be
measured.
Yet there
is no tool,
no machine
to measure
the width of
this love.

A silver lake of fog
rests by the ten oaks.

Smoke shivers too,
thin as a wafer.

Against the clouds
is a mirage of small birds.

Massless morning,
scalloped rain,

long as Sunday,
old as poison.

Long morning
chopped with sleep
drifts into a long
afternoon, also
chopped with sleep.
Evening brings
similar promises.

Some Sundays
take you in the
teeth and never
let you go.

A day for a lonely
cigarette in the yard,
for looking into the
mirror and reassessing,
for watching the trees
waving each to each.

Not much else now
but to take the little
pills and wait
for tomorrow.

You are somewhere between
Istanbul's drum-lined streets
& the streaks of stars,
soft as poached yolk
from the window seat
of the plane that carries
you across half the world.

You are something between
the dreaming green women
of Yeats and the painted
women in long galleries
who patiently wait with me
for your intelligent eye.

When I'm feeling down,
you speak to me -
I almost drown
when I'm feeling down,
but black and brown
give way to jubilee,
for when I'm feeling down
you speak to me.

I don't always know when
I'm being loved - early years come back
to bite. You make this easier -
second guesses die on the vine.

All that's left for me to
wonder is what to tell
you when I'm feeling this tinge
of melancholy.
Do I report from "the Century"
to tell you about the two bottles
of Dark Horse I've put down,
celebrating the wild Derby
where the winner was nixed?

Or do I broadcast the sea curl
& salted air that pass your
name dune to dune in the
wild grass, as night eats
my cigarette and flicks sand
into my hair?  

Neither -
instead I blush toward
the evergreen stoplights as we talk -  
smile the little shells
that break the walk.

I sigh, go inside,
have a little Turkish lesson -"su ve süt"
& maybe that is enough.

Salt pulpit,
streeted sand,
brass and tar,
bell broken
by the new wave.
Evening splinter
stuck in riprap,
memory hurled
into sharp relief.
Pilings grow,
dead teeth
from rushing
gum of surf.
Night's tide
parks on
blue sand,
dies as foam.
Boardwalk
lights never
seem to waver.

The battlements stand
but half-built.
Made of wet sand,
the battlements stand
noble and grand.
With sea's salted silt
the battlements stand
but half-built.

The sea slides
away. Fog
banks the high
tide and lakes
wrap the
highway.

You are the
specter in
my mind.
Garnet
laughter
rings out
in the house
of sand -
it's yours.

I stay up
late, branded
with sea.
I think you
are the grace
of the world.
The beach
swerves into
umber mist,
& an absent sun
hums just below
the horizon.

Without you,
the night-walk
is so hollow.
Without you,
the cigarettes
burn in rooms
of rain.
Without you,
the shells
are striped
with longing.
My balcony
heart perches
above the salt
city.

How many
days will
the fog bank
the high tide
& lakes wrap
the highway?
How long
will the sea
slide away?

i.
Sew the sun
into you.
Let them
all complain
about your
radiance.

ii.
The sun
replaces
your heart.
Let them
try to break
it now.

iii.
The sun
is plural,
doubled
in your eyes.
Let them
worry about
the yellows.

iv.
Chew the sun
in the evening.
Let them
moan about
the bite marks.

v.
Fold the sun
into your poems
like a blind seed.
Let them
grow anxious
as the words come.

vi.
The sun shines
on the Seven
Hour City.
Let them
find it,
if they can.

vii.
Rescue the sun
from the brown
shackles of
cloud.
Let them
shield their
rain-dimmed
eyes in
surprise.

viii.
Hide the
sun in
a dune.
Let them
discover
night.

xi.
The family
of the sun
comes to
visit you.
Spread
the table
wide.
Let them
all peek
through
the windows.

x.
You
& and
the sun
strut in
the sky.
Let them
watch and
cry about
the arrogance.