~
Mother of many waters
the manner with which she ascends
is sympathetically informed
we are a running spring
from her womb
flowing along the magical line
of peaks and summits
to cascading fiery birthright

and the rain fell
and the snow settled
and the ice theologized
to remind us
the outside world still worships
her eruptive embers
~

The future is drawn and threading.

The future is sold and factory-sealed.

Just cold enough to be artificial, just feeling enough to be alive.

What comes after 'Z'
cannot be expressed
by letters or words.
I'm afraid, it's a bit of
snickersnee.

For they have their say
in our struggles and fears,
in our laughter and tears,
in our sighs and moans,
to deep within our bones.

They're in our very own
heartbeats, great and small,
in that place within us
where some rain must inevitably fall.

Where they came from is no mystery,
but we each tend to use them
in the secret hours
of our private history,

like a trail of breadcrumbs,
like a bridge we jump from,
never mindful,
never loyal,
always on the tip of our tongue,
and there it toils...

How many steps are in a donut?

How many calories in a mountain?

If only I could climb salad bars

Or scale frozen foods

To the happiness of Candyland

Where the sweetest things

Rise with the sun

Or shoot for the moon

Victoria has a secret,
and now it's high time
to get this off her chest:
for what seems an eternity
she's endured them.

Far from supporting or uplifting,
instead they get under her skin.
If she lets them slide on the job,
it only makes for awkward
adjustments later.

Still, they used to adore her,
shoulder-to-shoulder,
now they're a form of torture.
True, they were never an exact fit,
but sometimes they worked wonders.

Now, they make subtle digs at first,
but by day's end
they've always left their mark.
It's said to keep one's friends close
but one's enemies even closer,
and that's no stretch.

Maybe it's time to string 'em up and free the ******!

~
Bitter moon

Cold harvest

The fruits of your labor
never to ripen
~

phobic sky
orphic sea
malleable beings
exposed to the atmosphere
can we finally be surfacing?

aliferous dreamscape
living, breathing
particles and waves
sediments that the glacial ice
has carved off the earth
to build their erosion timeline

a memory of us together
collecting stones
touching hands
filigree and shadow metanoia
in the sanctuary where we feel safe

can we finally be surfacing?

~
Ragged mist of stalled horizon,
from dry dock
to disadvantage point

second hand shops
of sackcloth and ash,
they contain multitudes

treading the outside edge
of perception,
rehearsing disaster
in fistfuls of earth,
and the immaterial:
the stuff of pure shadow

a bevy of dead buildings
resemble a fallen actress
in the throes of dance,
with emaciated figurines leaning
forward in the temple,
listening for clues
too far to whisper

work will never resume
on the tower,
and it will remain painfully scanty,
a place to bury strangers
or raise up cholera

the third world summer
sun on sacred walls,
red before orange,
let the rays burn away our sins,
we contain multitudes

but one step inside doesn't mean
we understand anything
~

What on Earth
took you? Do we dare land?

A lark of descension. An aborted beginning.
Moon trills.

Captain is dead
at the controls.
Mother gives birth in the airlock.

Trouble in the passageways.
A struggle to name it.
A drink before eclipse.
All that's wrong with the world
sounds like harmonium in the (wishing) well.

First flight over Hölderlin's Archipelago,
creating new and stranger versions
in the sandclouds.
So this is
Tharsis Rise?
Life without a trace.

Non-terrestrial Martian field.
Halcyon flowering seas. A rock with no trees,
no urban hopes.

Yet, the whole universe inside
wants to be touched.
I love you in zero gravity,
pushing tender buttons.
*** as solution.
Moon trills.

A kiss of atmosphere.
This alien womb.
Those android embargoes.
Our children are born echoes of astronauts.
Lunar schedules
their first words.

There's a lightspeed sensibility
to this type of marriage and parenting:
no leaving the hub,
no exit procedure.

The Sol they sing
is a harm hymn,
moon trills,
subject to the ladder and the weight of breath
this outside Earth.

But I love you in the veil of a twilight moon.

We're monuments
burned into moments.
Moments without a beyond.

Fading chorus
to a sing-along rapture
a laugh of clarification
a hasty placement of hands
and knees, dovetailed
yes, those eyes
~ still lit and power-surged
but give her a moment
(...)
for all the sudden
it tickles

~
we two are a moon
in our common era

a clan of rainfall

use of water as sacred currency
chanting for a once held belief
fallen through the thread

light years from home
it's a pilgrimage
to hear the brontide

to feel our own unique gravity
guide us ashore
~

Metropolis is dust,
the smoke of unfaded coffin nails,
she's a sensual bonfire
littered landscape,
the burning lust running in my veins
between safety and risk,
circumcising the stage
where Dylan went electric.
~
"I didn’t belong to anybody then or now.”

Swing-shifting to mercenary mode,
but sinking my face value
by ordering takeout religion,
sharing a cab with Hepatitis C,
and all those sky-high boxes
and rectangles
—existing in one, spending nights
with her in another.
~
"Oh, lay me down to sleep
upon the trickery of time."
~

~
I. Fog Glossaries
'Echoes don't tell lies,'
but inclement weather so often does.
look!
between whales and feverish thought,
between their sparkle and debris,
what is brewing systematically,
right under the surface,
might be terrifying.
or it might not.

II. The Cruxifiers
Time and life are machines that manufacture doom,
their sparkle and debris calculatingly withheld,
like keyholes to dark rooms that they
—in their reserved attack—never let you into.

III. Oceano Dunes
Bedouin princess—Charis Wilson tumbling
with Edward in the sand
—a photo finish.
—a young woman's triumph.
—a naked gift wrapped in sparkle and debris.

IV. Jellyfish Are Murderers
Here's a hint,
needle mark refineries are back,
expanding and contracting
in Baltic Sea,
in sparkle and debris,
smack after smack,
umbrella bell stings send
another pearl necklace
of dreams to its grave.

V. Container Ships
Substance A covers the outside hull,
Substance B is leaking from everyone's ears,
still the captain smiles, sailing straight ahead, ignoring the crew
as they turn into sparkle and debris.

VI. Mouth Guards of the Apocalypse
No one on the submarine is listening,
scopes up, spirits down,
current position unknown,
longer commutes, shorter lives
recede the fear of sparkle and debris,
by hiding out in the guest rooms,
waiting for a messiah drink
or perhaps a palindrome:
'never odd or even
no lemon, no melon.'
It's all so sour to the teeth and gums
of Armageddon's kids...

VII. Womenfish
Lost girls drive rental cars, change identities at rest stops. They shuffle down an otherwise sunny street beneath their own personal raincloud, shivering in an oversized coat. They imagine they're a parable stretched over the sea and not just mere sparkle and debris.

VIII. A Mother’s Book of Hours
At home and in her head
the roots get tangled,
so she storyboards each morning.
the lathe of heaven
must be Morse code
for death of romance.
she hears silent music
as her children sleep,
as whales sing off the coast,
they share their blood,
they share sparkle and debris.
there's a sweet little lie
baking in the oven,
she doesn’t want to talk about it.
she wishes her dreams were longer
and catches an interested eye
at the dream window,
her hands surrendering
their attempt to conceal,
naked is her perfect disguise,
you can hear her repeatedly asking,
“Who have I lived for?”

IX. The Pavilion of Dreams
How often I dream water,
some are lakes and seas,
others Olympic-sized pools,
each a self-portrait,
holding fast to the resurrections unseen,
to the digitally etiolated detail of the comedown,
every chimera ending
with my mind floating
just beneath the surface with all
the other sparkle and debris.
~

Let's swim about, Peter
Mimic my sound

Speak my language
You precious bottle-nose

The trouble you have
With the letter M
Sure makes funny bubbles
Beneath the surface

What then should we talk of
This morning?
Miss Kelly, perhaps

Every room
Is an island, my child

Never isolate your love

Let it run to the sea
It's where I will always be