I had the longest dream

you were there and mom
was in your head

our pets had all gone blind

dad was bathing
a baby jesus
in the basket
of a bike

I began to forget
things, the toy

that ate
its young

for Kazim Ali*


two sons
share a pencil
then trade
ghost plate
for alien
stomach

No newborn can reach existence.
Sleep knows memory
cannot fix
an eggshell.

( into a field
  fled water
  from the spine
  of the lord )

Erections turn the stomach to salt.

made not
into a fisher
of men
my father
pushed off
in the little boat
of his wound-

so filled
the weeping bowl
of my mouth.

for Brian Dawson*  


god
to me
was any
word
my father
didn’t
know.

profess
to know.

your brother slips in the shower, and then down the drain.  friends, with other friends, get on a plane.  your mother calls.  she is angry that you’re not angry about not being made to scale.  you say into a curtain- one piece of red cake please.  today, you will make it to the top of a baseball bat.  father will make a little promise below his arthritis.  your wife will make you happy.  she will say happy birthday- it’s a model of the city you wanted to drink in.

said they had seen my father waving his arms and that he’d been eating something raw because it was on his lips and he was a different man. said that many were screaming their mouths onto the windows of the subway or dropping their heads between the legs of weak children as if they were to carry on command bowling ***** to the sober dammits. said they and said they so early my ear I had to put it on the table next to a spoon my father used quietly last week everyday of it. began god his forgiving of bears being seen downtown and began I to get very hungry to hear my father mock blowing mock broth to keep it in the bowl.