her makeup
made a tiny mocha stain
on the inside lip
of my yellowed sink

as I drove home
and listened to the oldies
a man stumbled through crosswalks
under the old railroad
his shadow looked
noosed through the beams

the next day
I watched a squirrel eating
styrofoam like cotton candy

I wonder if we feel
how everything moves
around our heads

molasses and lightning
the surf and the coast

I don’t always feel drowned
I don’t always feel whole

our sky is spectrum

there is the peace of
a lake’s night-face
in our presence,
the ratchet of a thousand
orbits encircled-
wholly intersected through the palms.

a collective vibrato.

this unmasked, awesome wave of
silent happenstance
gathers kneading masses
to lay deadly beneath
oaken inscription,
cast about the heavens
in splinters of light.

our shaken, fevered dance
does not separate the halves
we are corpus callosum,
a passing stab embodied,
writhing jazz rhythm
untouched from pre-production.

so slice us into maps.
paste our highwayed bodies
in the grinding gloom
we will be your compass rose
when the pedals
are no longer smooth.

we will grace the dirt
when oceans are no comfort.

the palm-lines of healers
and street urchins
are the same.

child,
this anthem is your name.
if blood runs black,
a frame collapsed,
will we sing over your grave.