The British anthropologist enjoyed rare tribesmen.
But after seeing his article published in the prestigious Journal of Anthropological Research,
he kept the poor man on the coals a little longer,
thinking, "Well done, old chap."

I hold the tool. I am the blade. I drive
myself into the fertile ground. I dig
potatoes out. They were buried alive,
but in darkness they thrive. Now the old pig
will feast. When he grows fat I will slay him
to feed me and kin. I don't like killing
but when necessary it's not a sin.
I shall live another year, God willing.
I have long been on the land. I am old
but my sun is not yet setting in the
sky. When I was a child I was told once by
my father you become earth when you die.
If so, I hope my children carve my chest
with blade. I hope I'll yield a fruitful harvest.

What if all that counts is a kiss,
hugs are fallacies and a good word
conspiracy to make us miss
the obvious: lips on lips?

on sunday mornings
the streets sigh
with hideous anticipation
awaiting an answer to a question—
unspoken—
is the city dead
or not yet awoken?

on the ropes: pummelled;
somehow, he stays on his feet:
the bell ends the round!

I've a clever little friend
who guides me to
a world of neverend
where all the twists of fate
are twine
wrapped around my compass mind
pointing north
or in
or through
an acute tangle of you
th—

downpast where the divermin dont go
is an underwater sun
that casts a blackhole shadow
in to the fishes swim
but they donnot swim out
where oh where do they fishes go
after theybin drowngone in the shadow
after theybin infosucked by the blackhole
i say i dont know
but some days i think i seem them
floating on the cloud forms
as crows

every day is a second chance
as the first is already lost,
every love is a second dance
as the first still plays in your thoughts,
every life: a second glance
at a past at present not worth its cost.

how tranquil it would be
to sleep as deeply
as an anchor
at the bottom of the sea

ants protest the rain
in vain / water flows / terrain
specked with ant remains

Rip the saintly halo
From above your hallowed brow
To see how it obscured
A deep satanic vow
As through your skull are sprouted
                   Two twisted bony horns:
A rose no more disgracing
A beautiful stem of thorns

chisel into rock
from no-form form: extracting
the sculpture within

diagonally
wet lines slice the dry summer
storm rages; sun rests

grass wet with cold dew
the dawn light bathes me anew
asleep beside you

we blossomed once
in the desert
two green weeds
seeking rootless pleasure
now flower bedded
horticultured—yet wistfully I miss
the *****
of cactus lips

reach out ye white antler antennae
up to the succulent sky
tree teach me how to always be
growing, spreading finger branches high
teach me roots
teach me the hidden why
of the fruit of not every leaving
is to die, tree
reach out ye white antler antennae
and blossom me into life

a filthy habit
drying in the sun / spotted
with little bits of nun

the night cracks the sun
like an egg into a pan
over the ocean

but does He please you?
asked the snake. nightfall in the
garden of eden

in living we all walk toward the dawn,
through moonless nights,
through cold and touchless mist,
yet sunbirth come: only some shall carry on,
the rest remain,
in pain,
to on departed souls subsist.

sweet birdsong consumes
the bitterness of cities
a summer morning

Let's lose our minds amongst the olive trees
Labyrinth of oiled imagination
Twirl like falling leaves / falling to our knees
in unbalanced joy and veneration
of ourselves. For there is nobody else
but us; there is no other time but now,
Red flowers bloom. A blue shadow propels
a still landscape into being somehow
fluid. Timelessly we swim, wet within
each brush stroke branch and painted wave of wild
emancipation—to forget the din
of the wretched asylum. Vincent smiled:
Dive too deep and you shall go insane,
The olive grove remains the other side of the pane.

riverside dusk
      daylight's pale remains
a sanctuary

Five red haired maidens / resting symmetry
Draped in bluest sky / arranged peacefully
Interwined pink flowers / chaining togetherly
One composition / from Antiquity
Arms wilt with leisure / classically painted
Their wild thoughts blooming / a pale recreation
Seated in judgment / of time untainted
By modernity / By degradation
in eternal youth / in a single row
They sit and they watch / seasons come and go

why do you have wings
if not to fly? /  for me to
pin you down by—

From the eleventh floor
the world looks small
and possible

The cars
     black and white
     parked perpendicular
          to the curb
     parallel
          to each other
are keys
     ebony and ivory
    
I reach out
through the window
and play the street like a piano

summer lingers on
september on and on and
gone /   chill of october dawn:
pink frost, dew, warm bed, me, you
          —till the alarm clock turns on.

Two posts emerged on my Facebook,
And sorry I could not peruse both
And be one user, long I stood
And scrolled down one as far as I could
To where it went into a long blockquote;

Then read the other, as just as shared,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was classy and about footwear;
Though as for that the likes there
Had rated them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
I believe with no comments written back.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever tap back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two posts emerged on my Facebook, and I—
I read the one less thumbed-up by,
And that has made all the difference.

at this rate we die
beheaded by the second hand
nervous tick of hours

when already in his mind
he'd dusted himself off like a rooster
run down the hotel stairs
gotten on the train
to quickly
escape from her
to where the black pepper grows

she, snuggling up to
him with both eyes firmly closed
had already built with them
a house
smelling of dinner
and fresh children
to which he'd just come running
up the stairs

(in reality
he and she had slept
together for the first time
and lying
keep silent about this precisely
in two foreign
mutually unknown
languages)

They built a lighthouse,
to warn the ships.
The ships transported the sea.
You professed your love,
with living lips.
Your lips spoke words that buried me.

Tanker ships containing water,
run aground upon the sand.
A human being becomes a monster,
by another human's hand.

The future dies within.
The past is always evaporating.

As the tanker rusts,
so I also must,
until we are but two derelict husks,
filled with nothing but regret.

Once, here was the sea,
voluminous and wet!
Once, I was me,
until the day we met.

A billiard table imprints its damp shadow
on a yellow wooden floor. The game still
unbegun, mere fragment of the sorrow
felt by the patrons whose wilted heads will
still be here tomorrow, if tomorrow comes.
Red walls distended by burning lamps
and burned out hearts beating blood through ear drums:
Reverie to the night god /   Dreaming tramps
drowning in their heads in lakes of absinthe
color of the ceiling better than being
awake but indefinitely absent.
The lamps blink, eyes floating, speak all-seeing:
Vincent, let us meet before you entreat
the crows out of your head into the wheat.

In the beginning the sky was cold butter,
hard and riddled with kernels of corn,
which, as the world heated, popped:
And thus the clouds were born.

coffee cup broken
pieces strewn across the floor
sharp words were spoken
now we are silent;       no more
(s)weeping;    sad ceramic gore

nothing but the wind
escapes this abandoned house;
flowing,       it pushes
all the sunlight out   until
we are alone in darkness

The world inside / the house
is empty, and you're hanging on-
to the railing one final time,
before your father starts the engine /
you're moving out / you're gone
deep into your book, the one
you took (from the library with no
intention of giving back) so long,
childhood; so long: shadows
expanding on the lawn as you sink
into your thoughts / into the wall,
feshly painted so the house would sell,
reading: receding: what you could never tell
your parents. [ ... ]
"Let's go," your mother calls,
but you're no longer there. She doesn't
notice that you're staying / it isn't
you who is obeying, exiting the door.

we are astronauts,
alone,
among the stars seeking solace
in an infinite unknown.
we are suns.
we are daughters
of carbon—gravity-bound
to disposable celestial bodies
revolving against a cosmic background
radiation.
we are space stations.
we are planets,
populated sparsely.
if to each other we matter,
we matter only darkly.

setting down the kettle,
in the light of the setting sun,
pouring water, the green tea leaves settle,
at the bottom of a teapot, brewed for no one.

city din under
-standing passengers passing
below the l train

Among the hideous shapes
   you are my favoured
For the wretched silence of your scoliotic spine
   flavoured with our crimson wine:
Blood diamonds
   screaming songs of sirens
   writhing on a desiccated island's edge
Boiled alive—
   can be distilled into the language of a pledge
I hereby promise to be yours
Foretell you will be mine

stormless nightscape
neon lightning
car-thunder and auto-hum
the dark doldrums
sky scrapes
violence even in brightest daytime
the city is
its own weather system
tempestuous / slum
lashing / victims
of architecture: humans undone
slithering, slithering
we,    slugs of no sun

another day, another lotion,
sighed, “much rather be making potions.”

tedium, boredom, boil and bubble,
add a spice, then add it double,
stir it well and let it settle,
in a kettle,
made of metal.

what's your fancy, what's your trouble?
basin clogged with dwarven stubble?

make one balm,
you've made them all!
concoct a cream, a cream?—a cream!
one more grog burn,
swear I'll scream!

tedium, boredom, boil and bubble,
add a spice, then add it double,
stir it well and let it settle,
in a kettle,
made of metal.

give me dragons, give me daggers,
give me jewels with emerald feathers!
give me—“what?
what's this, right now?
of course I know exactly how!”

roots to find, true essence to distill,
adventure?
no, but pays the bills.

I've got more scars than memories
but they heal just the same
I've walked too far without looking back
to find my way home again

water drops
     drip on rocks
          from the tops
               of tomahawks

accepting nothing
think without disconcerting
the unity of—
hear

we are lapses in
judgement, human and divine
accidents alive

someone once said,
a negative mind will never give you a positive life,
but that is itself a negative thought,
which must be the product of a negative mind,
if it is true, it's false,
and if it is false, it's true,
but what identifies a princess is not a tiara but a shoe,
or, positively said,
a negative mind will give you a positive life,
for to live uncritically
is indistinguishable from being dead