the wisdom of your eyesight

begins with you legs that turn the body’s odyssey
away, sort of, in the general right direction

but thou stiff neck person, yet still turns away
from what the eyesight will see when the eye shadows lift

thine eyes cast down still seek escape, with last minute haste,
but my pointer finger rests easygoing beneath thy chin

where the finger meets, lifts, thy softened chin tissue,
to look directly at your proffered savior, an electric election circuitry

this head-on-collision of two pair, beat by a full house,
when the combined wisdom of caring lifts two up,
ah, the best writ we ever scripted,
the best hand we ever played

if your eyes should cloud,
upon reading this,
this is too, a kind of wisdom,
wisdomkind


for S.B.

Going back
is a Fool's
Paradise

Its un-
truth is
its
Per
Fec
Tion

the delicate
bead
of your kiss

A tongue
enunciating
what the
present
Can Be

makes
it all

So Clear
Worth
while
Good
night

but not
Good
bye

to us
maybe
but
You and I

still stand
strong
think
clear-
ly

have twisting
desires
guns
in our backs

for some tattered
and tear-stained
piece of Truth

We cannot
be
Con
Tained

within the realm
of
Re
Collec
Tion

Let us bleed
out
into the
frightening
cold

of our stark
Day
Light
Dreams

Jesus, I own
thoughts that
align me
with you!

You are
a confusing cup
of cigarette tea

And we
are working
to let

our meat
be malleable
our minds
supple and
our tongues
agile

in the warm
embrace of
the other's

Mouth
Heart
Eyes
Another

universe
of dangerous
Pos
Si
Bi
Lity

To hell
with Duality!

The past
is Simplicity!

**** what is
wrong
Know what is
Right

and live to see
the probability
of Tonight

You are the pleasing smell of Chinese grease
I am the invisible motivation to frolic in the fountain

You are a stranger's giggle &
an invitation to dance

I am a Cabaret Voltaire 12"
& half a clove cigarette

You are the diaphanous nature
of auburn clouds at twilight

I am the woman who raised you
but never dared speak your name

You are that familiar left shoe
abandoned on the roadway
never finding its twin

I am an expectant evening
after an expectant morning
spent talking on the phone

You are the receiver
the near-silent listener
the breather of shared truths

I am the walker the watcher
the faint scent of prawns
near the dumpsters at work

You are a newborn angel
a pageant of colors & functions

I am a poet, no matter
where you find me
lost on a street corner
that I'll never own

You are a plane ticket, yes
only one way to answer

I am a handstamp still worn
but only as a reminder

You are the fairy lights
strung between broken
promises only barely remembered
after a night washed in ***

I am a cluster of strangers, drunk & excited
We are the gift of mystery, alone at the table

We are mutual, the future
the last to be opened

We are the mission completed
the present grown tall

at the bottom of a stagnant lake
lived a dead forest
black trunks standing
knuckle deep in muck
branches simply armature
for a fluttering array
of gray scarves
blowing in the watery wind
molds and aquatic plant life
growing quieter in near darkness
the forest laid down years ago
gave up the sun and the breezes
the same arguments from the same birds
slid back toward the sandy edge
then gradually leaned over
one after another they followed
under the forgiving cover
of progressively longer nights
a very slow migration
the stars really weren’t watching
eventual full immersion
nothing left uncovered
but the land around the lake
the gray water always present
became all any tree could remember
oxygenating the murk for a while
the contradictions grew
in place of leaves
instead of hopeful young twigs
stanchions indicating nothing
huddled together under the surface
standing sunken in an air more dense
a different kind of time passing
light arriving but
only in soft whispers