stretching to length of gallows
under faint light of moon.
the dead buries the living.

a thing is not a thing in itself
as it denotes nothing.
like a peripatetic iamb inscribed

persisting in drivel. flowers her face
this evening. pillars her arms,
  i do not have a wife.

i do not have a love undressed
as i examine a pool of shadow
in the plenary recess of silence.

the dead buries the living
within the blue-headed noon;
fascist birds bellow over haciendas,

tuba from the dustwell, from the orchard
decorated with blood. it rings for me
a guttural voice: hustling down

the avenue of the dead. better the alternative,
the guillotine, the small beginning of rage
through the thickness of air.

a marauder sleuths as the living keep
on keeping on, as the dead resign
 a hindrance under dissonant skies.

she is not with me as all the others are.
they have passed on expired limitations;
a flash of lighting at the back

of startled hills. rivers shake cool waters
 down my sleeve and i sleep -- soon fields
will be nasal with dew and the children

will have their place in heaven. the damp
landscape will adhere to stucco, fashioned
to cerements on corpses reeking, rising

to altitudes where some birds
in spring soar, left thriving in smog
as i bid you good night, farewell.