No phone call tonight.
The sick moon
coughs a cloud -
like a gray stain
on its face -
& I watch
as the new cloud
falls through the night
like a guillotine.

Sick moon,
thin and waxing,
my chest is
a curving hurt too.
Twisted and torqued
by the old carving forks
from the Thanksgivings
where red wine
sat screaming, and
polished plates
were also moons,
hard and silent
and empty.

No phone call now,
the breakup is done.
I shed my skin and salt it.

No phone call now,
only vagrant silence.
The sick moon breathes
a scrape of cloud
down the quiet
spine of night.

he sits alone in the
darkness

on a wooden chair

The walls surrounding him
have no
mirrors and
the windows are covered
by the thickest blinds

He doesn’t want to see his
old age

and the decay that already
started consuming
his body

In his mind he’s still
young, still
in his early twenties

still dreaming

He’s listening to music

He’s playing the music
and it exhausts him

The music comes from
within

An instrument with strings

His growling guts

He lubricates them with more
beer

Returning to the past?
         but not too much
        lest you only half-live
       and lose the present's vibrant touch

        there's more gain than loss
        if you will care to unlearn
        seize all you can from the moment
        what went before is no longer for you to yearn

She was dressed
business **** the
night we
read poetic love
letters to each other on
public access television.
It was like
that mad moon night was
made just for us.
Magic show in between our
readings.
Is it all just a dream,
dreamt by a dormouse
asleep in a ***** bottle?
Don't wake that furry little
screwball.
This can't end.
Wedding plans,
torts and tarts, and
a tiara for my queen.
My heart is stained by
her love.
My soul reeks of
our champagne celebration.
Life,
together forever,
unmolested by
the concrete and the crows,
and the godless
heathens, bent on
their toboggan ride to
hell.

This poem will say nothing.
"Clouds snowed in the yard,"
and I record it here,
for reasons unknown even to myself.
The clouds have wine-dark pelts,
but that’s nothing new: skies are hard
to find new lines about. Poets fear
the cliché, try to enjamb around it – won’t help.
What is the jaggy cumulus mouthing
in the upper distance? Coagulating lard,
the snow meets salt, goes gray. Look up, peer
into that distance: skullish hills melt,
discolor into the hue of bruise or welt,
as if even the earth self-flagellates, regards
this day with self-loathing. I’ll change gears:
turned skyward like a telescope,
this poem said nothing.

Bone in the branch,
right on the face of it,
embedded symmetry.
Tillerman's lawn chain
in a dead leaf choker,
garbling the sway.
Maple skim dip,
a patch of buttresses,
pooling October.
Inert array,
flicking cardinals,
shoal's chaotic mural nose.
So many days like this day,
indistinguishable,
crushing.