red wine beads at my brow
I wait to wince

poppies dance out in the yard
in the little warmth from seasons since

her feet trail away
the broken magnum at mine

head, heat, blaring haze
scythes at the atlas of my spine

scorn and disgrace
raw and insipid

the sun turns its face
lends whatever light to the wicked

she said she'd put the fear of god in me
but god is not what I fear

not what oppresses my feet
nor the ache of my best years

he does not hang from her tongue
like the prize of her spiced ***

any vestige of will; any spirit, any trace
for any iota of refrain

quashed, quelled
concealed and contained

another fickle whine
another fleeting wish

any mistake I've made is mine
and hers are carried on the wind

she speaks like the end;
the war, and then what's won

no more sour a tend
than to the wounds of what's been done

the world armed to defend;
her foes a heavy sword against a throng so young

infantile infantry
ripened from infancy

what a weapon are my sons

what a kindness she's coughed up

she says I'm too young,
but sadness manifests the same
so I place my broken jaw
back into its broken place

a modern epimetheus
dragging my prudence by the reins
confronted with the trouble that'd been steeping
for years on the fire

and like the ferris wheel that spun every summer
that I lost interest in
as I sloughed more and more of my childhood skin

I look off into the fog, salt and sand
'n the moon perched so highly,
a king in the sky
sending off its armed stars to cut through the night

****** from this nonage fantasy
by the bitter taste of tobacco in my mouth

maybe I can't love anyone

not yet

it heralds something
like the men that hike the piedmont, there

like one hundred and forty five moons
and you're stubborn, yet

it is a catalyst

like the curve of that road
like tapping on the sill

born in the heat
and tossed into the chill

and you're stubborn, still

patient for summer
so stubborn, still

you'll wait for the warmth
aching in the outfields
for the fire to spread
and carry you off
with its soot soiled hands

weak-kneed,
heavy-eyed,
stumbling

I push through the thicket
to the patch of land
where the air is thick
with burnt pine and turmeric
to where the moon sets
spry on the water

I take my legs
and offer them to the strait
my plunge
into the euripus

what use are they
if not to walk
to the nape of hope's neck?

well, then
it is this
I am whelmed
carried off by the cold swell
of adam's ale

then, somewhere
along the river
and its rushing stupor

I hear singing
a voice that rings like clinkstone
and the ecclesiast begins to pull me
a quiet accompaniment
careful quiet, in the night –
such is thievery

subtle, without much grief
take me

for whatever gold I am
whatever glimmer that I could give
burnished of whatever sin