This *****
Artificially awake
Lydia
apples 20 years have passed
oranges i want a do over
manhole cover coins
savage glares across the 4 wheeled property lines
young moms not giving a ****, that's alright
kiss of sun hidden from
anxious from blue oak , it's ridges pluming in the dappled twist
and floundering wave, wiggling wave of oak leaves green as frogs.
ponytail suzy, *** from galaxy sci-fi
i brought up a cup while it was empty there,
but so distracted by my own trembling effort,
every hair a furry hood, every fatty fixture of my face a rebounding basset hound
tennis shoes up to my neck, dumb naked in my greenery,
already old somehow, the window closing,
the permanency of parks, like a stilletto in a limosine,
green fixture of my white blinded attempt to see tomorrow,
tourist .
thoughts of Sylvia
, my gaping awe at the feminine,
and its green garden.

-cbrander

to get to the salmon run, through the burning bush
ask the catfish.
where is the hunting ground, where is the gathering bush.
I sit on these winds, blowing around an island volcano,
sitting on its chest like a city baboon in the street chewing on rinds.
Making alien eyes with a sanctuary dream,
happily orange on the bends of rising,
from warm to chill,
in autumn pavement.

=cb merp

to curl up,
to go brown and crisp with drying edges,
hearing the ears, the ears hissing of space.
sitting,
falling, bone on bone resting into their couplings, their pile, their doll form.
hanging, by threads and rubber, my guts, my heart, gurgling with eyes wide, pressed to the floor.
sinking, into the chair, compressing, my flesh kneaded, an ***** of folded clothes, seamless fabric edges.
fading eyesight, in my thoughts which are empty as parked cars,
leaning halfway over the shadowy cool ponds of the evening,
smelling wet, heavy, musky, bouquet, night air,
a watching forest.
alone, free and forsaken, light as dandelion seed,
scratching at my dreams with shrieks of protest, we sail.
icy stems snapping, autumn to winter, charcoal liver.
waiting peacefully amongst the tiniest renters,
the other crawlers of the quiet house.
idle unit. murmuring water cooler.
The plane of death is cool grey slate. Well dressed, impassable, implacable.
This is the valley that sinks, wet warm and green,
humming, buzzing and ******.
wary and jutting, retracting before his spit touches the water,
playing with his mucus, a boy soon to meet his father.
His father cried, like jesus, with eyes rolled back like a shark,
in the hospital paliative care unit, unshaven, deflating.
Sylvia Plath's inky fingers,
hushing my lips, keeping the secret, where there is no secret.
trade the moon for a penny, because the penny is real.
implacable is his love for the park, his spring over the stream,
over the cracks in the pavement, where the weeds grow,
in beautiful greens, with the sound of crickets,
playing their combs.



cbrander

tresses dire
tresses green
cascading tresses
tresses exercise, chaos
fate, a skipping stone
meeting a pond
before crossing over
dropping
sleeping in a dusty hall
at one with the earth,
the wave.
At peace where i should be
as earth,
slowly turned and permeable
as a bird caught in the storm of the flock.
A bird song note struck
in the din of the century,
groundhog day of consciousness,
8000 terracotta to be buried with.
blue eyes has the wisom,
his old monkey red skin,
flea bags howling at the deities,
loud voices driving the chariot,
of the Denver Broncos.
Warriors of steel,
the embrace of my child,
is a moment to keep,
tethered to the surface of the pond,
with all the magic deity will afford me.

cbran

mission accomplished, more banged up than before
miserable town, frowning boy down, corner of the couch, corner of the bed
no coffee smell toffee, wonderworks of crystal, spindling light of internal echo.
dangerous is my name should i be pulled from you like a fishhook,
a harpoon of lust, of an unlived life as some one else. You changed me.
In the shade of familial distrust, lion lays, lion starves, lion groans a weak retort,
smeared along dust and blown away with the magic of cricket chirps and sun blaring white
fading to dusk.
I am complete. Sorrowful hound, muzzle draped along the rocky shore by the waves.
I turn into a flock of seagulls. I'm gone, like a turpentine in the pond.
-cbcbcbcbcbcbcbcbcbcbcbcb

i'll get you one of these days,
anyway;
tin can alley doomsday,
hooray;
cans of acid spray,
in the basement of our youth parade.
Fatally questing,
for a truth we've never known;
to get back to the story,
and the green grass bare bones.

I hear that man a' shouting,
from heaven's cloudy nook,
baby darling's deer eyes,
glowing wet,
like they were shook.
Passionately declaring, my love for saints is real!
The yellow bulldozer is whirring,
how's boy's love to cop their feel.

Baby black bear's purring,
watch our for momma, she's lost her pill;
dreary snow come calling,
i know that dream scape will...

I hear that man a' shouting, from cloudy shaken nook;
"i hate that you were smoking,
instead of reading that ****** book."

Give a little chance, for the living to go on,
my darlings in the brush,
you're almost there, where i've known.


jingle jangle jingle bingle janggggg....

-cbrander

I'm a golden cami-soul
i can easily explain,
i'm a camisole in the rain,
i'm more naked than a woman,
than if i were kissing a man,
to free myself from dreary kids,
and life itself.
they aren't mine, they are mine
those ****** amenities.
Those darned lost years, the flying wick,
Job after job, noth-ing would stick,
i'm back to being a lady of the night.
It's my birthright.

I'm a winter cami-soul,
no eyes, no mouth, about 4 feet tall.
Drunk on my allusions, i'm out of wine.
I'm out of time.
I'm hanging clean out on the line.

his breath awaits,
the iron of the pulpit.
every one but the bartender,
says i "told you so".
I'm silken as a pair of jeans,
i'm a dime.

-cbran

Grief;

How deep is your well,
Kept clean in a garden,
Why do you empathize,
with grief,
as if you could fly by,
and catch them on your hooks,
to carry them to the distant morning,
with heroic stamina.
Your horizon is red like her,
Egypt,
your hollow waiting,
your distant sun,
your ocean of patient grief,
the weight of planets,
is perhaps just a channel to Tuscany.
-floating-
This happy accident happened to you,
like a car crash, and then another slower one,
as more has passed than can come, passed middle age,
as you wither, because you're more careful,
but also because the branches sway,
the willow blossoms, and time will steal you from me.
You're awfully humble,
to be a passenger and gracefully wither,
with all your mindful might,
and bear the thought of what could have been;
a joyful child in his father's arms.
How deep is your well,
while Tuscany sleeps,
while the beach combers pick the glass from the sand,
that you yourself chewed so she would not cut herself,
dear Tuscany, who thinks only of herself,
who had to be reached by your well, so you grew so thin,
to touch her toes, and wash away again,
as the willow branch waves goodbye,
as a baby to a stranger driving by.
A winter well someday,
A dry well,
A forgotten well, a stone circle, another child's footsteps,
Another life alive, burning joy, born after you passed by,
to live having never met you.
Your lineage, dry,
wet by some other loving grief.
Long are the teeth in your mouth,
Long are the echoes of joyful children playing in the school ground,
which is your bell blessing,
that you ring when you arrive.
Passenger,
Driver,
Man child.



-cb

(for my daughter)

i hope the grey clouds come today
to blanket the sky, misty slate and grey
block out the angry rays and keep us cool
so the salamander can lick his eyes by the pool

the cardinal's come back, the bluejay too
all manner of sounds
raucious caw and ribbony twirl of xylophones and whistles
lovely these creatures we hear alike
as creatures of habit and simple delights

cb

Her crane glass neck is long like a rose stem,
Her porcelain skin glows like neon cream,
Her red curls show age by growing blonde highlights,
as if the light inside has peeked through the stain glass,
and the sun has reflected off the brass bones of a lantern,
made of crystal and centuries of baptism,
and joyous clamor,
like a spirit dressed in a woman's pulchritude.
This is my daughter's mother.
Yet, i play a lonely hobo,
lamenting the moon's glow under the warmth of the sun.

-cb

Naive is the weather under the umbrella,
the umbrella holder,
hungry and sick.
if only there was something green in the fridge,
to get fresh,
to be dedicated, able to hold a memory,
knowing what's around the corner.
to labor,
to be empty and full again,
like rivulets of running water,
instead of the paste in my numb stomach.
Bright as blue the storm came,
pure as fresh rain on harsh gusts.
i want it again because i never lose desire,
to be fooled again,
and constantly enchanted,
into being an umbrella.

-cbrander

for when my thoughts make icycles and drip.

when my thoughts thaw into streams adjacent swamped cheap land, gutters by my family.

fuzzy red raw swollen hands, fists clenched on goose hearts,
on dartmouth writing clubs, my ivory skin sought tanning.

I remember my favorite russian girl i met there, long gone, her polyglot charm ringing like chinese bells tinkling,

Thoughts remember my daughter, grown under my intermittent sun,
As if she too is a visitor,
like visitors bless a place.
Like a place wishes to be flat
and run across by the rapid heart,
of a brown hare across the wet black asphalt,
of trapped wet lips, of an elderly man,
and balloons of blushing boys cheeks.

I squeezed the shoulders of baby's mum who's heart i broke as a fool stone. I gave her kisses rich as strawberries, because that's what she is.

Rabbits catch on hooks and crushed and stuffed in the black cool summer night full of ambitious boys' erections,

Reason to recall the things that are, the way they are wide inside the empty around that, which is most of everything, most of what blindness is.

My grandpappy went up Italy. And sixty years later this girl came here from Milan to explore. Tide in, tide out.
Now the hangover. Time to be sick.

-cbrander

matchstick novelty,
a lake,
soccer,
beautiful hairy arm
from a young man
blonde from sun
smelling sweet like
watermelon laundry lotion
like the sun, like youth.
The tangled hair
laid out across
the wrinkled hexes
of this forgetful cuddle arm...
thrown back into a blue sky
i once was.
i am
as a young ape,
with purple on the inside
of his eyelids
sinking flowers of falling asleep
orifice after orifice
senseless messages
to oneself
wondering if the nothing man
does right by my daughter.
Or, if no other line
could draw the blinds
on my secret world of laying still

foggy memories
the sound of tall grass
water droplet color   drop of water color
my mind
ready for sleep.

-cbrander

The mist on the pond.
nervous ducks, bird sanctuary.
new life, new things, tree blossoms.
ducklings, just two, very small.
a triad of flyers, carrying some spirit.
an encroaching of day, apologetic.
pleasure of green leafy chutes.
enamel bird song on silver air.
the glowing quiet.
fat squirrel guards the stump.
mirror of my steps, a hollow thud.
while i walk without a shadow,
breathing hard.

- cbrander

nothing in nature
brutal patience
savage patience
as i storm alleys
securing muffins from mom
in terrible control
scoring pavement
with my childlike imagination
plowing through the world
and all its floor plans and blueprints
bluebird lines, fresh, clean, white laundry paper, crinkly, skinny
the airy feel, light as tissue
scroll of knowledge
toy of iron
iron pipes, iron rebar, iron plans
sewer ideas, office measurements
library carpet.
Hairy hands stuffed in hot jackets
cuffs, buttons, patterns.
pencils, plastics, rulers.
perforated ceiling tiles stained brown
from leaks, cracked and sagging
sugar for my cereal, styrofoam wonder
my desk, your desk.
**** models crouching.
show me for twenty dollars
your model quiet soul.
peace in my office
peace before. peace after.
our shared ghost town memory of dad's workplace.