Malignant, an echo of
calamity
penetrates the aura
of American freedom
as humanity
asphyxiates
an arsenal
of political fascism
shape shifting
into beads
branded by mercury
abomination

I have learned that
   If things hurt most
  My eyes open widest

  If heart and head touch
        I stumble
        In as much as I would
        If I could

Tell you all that.

He is sick of looking at people,
at their heads,
from above.

So he climbs downwards,
unseen,
and dips into the shadow of a palm tree.

There he remains
until a child passes by
and frowns at the sight.

And he,
then,
mirrors the child
and after a while:

becomes the pavement,
becomes the street lights,
becomes the smoke that rises
the dust that swirls
around.

And at this very evening
as the sun sets,
all the smoke rises
and all the dust shoots

upwards again.

Stained glass coffins
Crystalline mosquitoes
Death that masquerades
In silken flags and floras
Languorous beauties
Graffiti of red and violet light
Sirens kiss the bullets
As they scatter them
To burn holes in sepia dreams
Watercolor ghosts
Casting out wildflower candy
Attics that hide under
Strawberry dust and lemons
That melts into mildew
As they pass down the gullet
Layers of ashes in the belly
“But you told us to swallow!”
Masses of children howl
The pretty ghouls hiss back
“Cannot you tell a lie by now,
By the sweetness of its taste?”

a liar in love
a crow in the cold
beginnings ascend
from the carcass of folly
what remains is the will
what survives is what
was there all along
courage is knowing

blunt tips of bent cigarettes
were incisive as razors -
sliced wrists weeping
bright red sentences,
spattered unborn to blank paper
and turned into statues
so the dead would always remember
what they did,
never safe in the graves
in which they'd took refuge

but blue on blue
was ever her color;
blue on blues
seeping from old sins,
deep, hidden within spidery veins
that traced pale, soft *******,
finally filling mute lips as she slept,
subsumed in oceans of color,
blues that gave stories, as waves to shore
subsided, reclaiming their pain,
and cleansed sand once more

What end to life!
a collection of furies like stone turtles
arranged on the mantle -
just a few dozen last words
tucked among ads for
Old Spice and Polident tabs
unread, used to line
litter boxes in Cambridge
or wrap fresh fish at Hay Market;

then, someone pausing to wave at the sky
missed saving the drowning woman
by years, if he'd tried,
finding questions in every answer;
child curled in hard lap of his mother,
her cold affections of words
blew from dead lips like old wishes
without tender touch or wet kisses;
but that life continued,
if lived only blue on blue

a hollow glass heart
filled with the blood
of all your past loves
beats with the sound
of crystal breaking
fragile to view
yet harder than diamonds
deceiving - danger where
beauty is known to
haunt my soul
red turned to the darkest
black, a whirlpool inescapable
by all who have fallen under
your spell, none leave
unscathed, most leave
broken and empty
shells of humanity
flirting with you
akin to placing my
mind in the jaws of a jackal
razor teeth hidden behind
luscious, soft, lips

Only men remember the names of their cars,
the make and model and the year they got them.

They can recall the feeling on their thighs
from the cushioning of luxurious leather
as they slide in with a longing sigh.

There is no will power known to man
that can keep their fingers from caressing,
the steering wheel spinning in their fantasy drive.

Eyes scanning the dash to inspect the odometer
praising the low mileage of where she's been driven
fooling himself that he's the driver that counts.

If only they understood the true lust of leather
comes in the form of wedges or stilettos,
and not only noticed when they're kicked off.

Which, by the way, are Pradas,
sold by Neiman Marcus,
bought last month at Fifth and Grand.

I like short poems, she said
And mechanically he –
Not knowing what –
Liked her and her head.

He wrote page after page,
Confusing her smile
With admiration and love,
Igniting her rage.

In the end she set fire
To a huge pile of paper
That included no more
Than his wish to admire.