I

The pistons rusted, the furnace grew cold and
I lost you at the coal face.

The cat had got it

and the rest was just noise

II

We left the strong-men, that mean looking lion.
We pushed back the linoleum ***** of a smaller tent,
liking the rubber on our hands.

I’m after the fortune-teller telling me
on the slopes of The Bones, she will say yes.

The tent was cloaked in this rotten perfume.
So smokey, you couldn’t see your hand for your fist.
I was dealt the Queen of Pentacles,
her the Hanged Man.
I watched her nose reflect in the crystal ball.

III

I watched a ghost
depart the dunking stool -
a soul disintegrate
from a Romany curse.

I was dizzied by the strike of a lampshade.
those shoulders I stood on
Were yours.

I rocked as your body was taken away.

IV

The storyteller had the world on his back!
Half Atlas, half time-snail, he was
Sticky with aphorism.

We listened to his TED Talk and when he left
the soil was fertile with prayer…

But nothing grew
til the sweat of the shovel-man
granted the earth some water.

V

Acceptance.
The attendant sprits
Spoke wisdom in
basic steps.
‘One thing at a time’
A stone cracked.
‘One thing at a time’
An Aegean Daemon watched,
A genie whispered…
‘One thing at a time’

VI

‘We’re putty.’
-Sarah stood up in class, obnoxiously-
‘Forged in volcanos, capsules of perfect evolution.
We’re of earth, of mud and rainforest and canyon.
Of the same stuff as moons, the sparkles
across a twilight ocean, the particles
caught in sunbeams. We’re the dust that worked.
We moved towards this... this beautiful complexity.
And you can be anything.’

VII

I drew a smile in lipstick
Across the face in the mirror

VIII

Sewing Machines.
dumpf dumpf dumf
Carolina’s hands.
working the tender silk.
Dumf, dumpf, dumpf,

IX

Ella’s lips around his *****.
David thrusted like a Spartan.
she comes
loudly.

X

I trust, honestly,
I trust what I see with my own two eyes.
I see us infected by Delhi Belly,
the muck from Gangees is flooding the Seine,
the Hudson the Thames.
It’s like the third morning
After one day of snow.
My father’s father
Has been forgotten. 

XI

Brian awoke on another Wednesday
gratefully ******* his gums.
Unlike in his dream
he still had his pearly whites.

XII

The dogwood fire licks his face.
Sunrise through the dense Bitterroot and
Wakan-Tanka.
Breath.
‘There is no separation,
Us and the river.’

I looked into the wisemans face.
Lined.
But all I wanted was to sketch an outline,
and step in to the silhouette of
Someone else.