"aqueduct" poems
~
*On a clear day
I can see my sister
It's between six and seven o'clock
and a beautiful expanse of water, reflecting her cultivated shores
a nod, a smile,
through the vapor
castles in the air, ruling over
the available light
then in a moment, she's lost
half her height
and bent into arcades, like those
of a Roman aqueduct
evaporate before me she will
the fading of family, a returning
to cold white at the dawning
of an unfriendly expanse*
~
Mar 28, 2021
Mar 28, 2021 at 10:20 AM UTC
Village rain that floods the aqueduct
bypasses the dam
and reaches all
of the town
houses.
Village
fire springs
from the soul
burns the people
and ultimately cleanses skin of sin.
Village residents, husbands and spouses.
Village residents, tiny little children.
Should they Drown or Crisp.
Feb 14, 2015
Feb 14, 2015 at 10:56 PM UTC
* dedicated to Rene Magritte *
An image of my grandmother
her head appearing upside-down upon a cloud
the cloud transfixed on the steeple
of a deserted railway-station
far away
An image of an aqueduct
with a dead crow hanging from the first arch
a modern-style chair from the second
a fir-tree lodged in the third
and the whole scene sprinkled with snow
An image of a piano-tuner
with a basket of prawns on his shoulder
and a firescreen under his arm
his moustache made of clay-clotted twigs
and his cheeks daubed with wine
An image of an aeroplane
the propellor is rashers of bacon
the wings are of reinforced lard
the tail is made of paper-clips
the pilot is a wasp
An image of the painter
with his left hand in a bucket
and his right hand stroking a cat
as he lies in bed
with a stone beneath his head
And all these images
and many others
are arranged like waxworks
in model bird-cages
about six inches high.
Apr 27, 2010
Apr 27, 2010 at 9:19 PM UTC
I woke up at angles with you
---a parallelogram, opposite but equal,
my thoughts in constant rotating view
---a diagram, showing us where
our homes are laid to rest,
where streets became dead spiders
caught in their own webs.
If we are in transit via tunnel,
aqueduct, or escalator,
it might be cinema.
If we lose atlas in the worship of light,
it might be cinema.
But I can't find you here;
here, where they used to build ships
from sand and steam
and science fiction;
where they used to design
buildings so as to create
a dissonant and mournful
whistling sound when wind
blew through them
---ostentatious things;
dead people’s things.
Through walls and underneath concrete, dug so deeply
into the wide plains
and withered, gnarled tree roots
of an agonizer's conurbation,
is a space halfway to the zenith,
charting the prescribed power
of in-betweenness.
Never again will we draw meaning from
our proximity to one another.
Dec 24, 2023
Dec 24, 2023 at 2:13 PM UTC
God bless wartime for lovers
And the heart's desire
For all things ammunition
The seminal spark
Of randomology
Runs as an aqueduct
To the mothership
Fascination is found
In strangeness
And its sister's alien sigh
The fun of fear
Is teeth and biomechanics
And morbid curiosity
Of what lurks in the brazen alcove
Abducted on Sunday morning
Returned in time for kickoff
Dressed like a fugitive
With a hole in your head
Souvenir of the brave and the new
The body's warm jets
Begin to stir as a powder keg
Any kind of love you've had
Is always far sweeter as a memory
A memory, angel
May 19, 2020
May 19, 2020 at 8:10 AM UTC
Kinetic energy
Without equilibrium
A fixed star
Collapsing in on itself
There she stares unblinked
At stellar remnants
Sprawled face up
In the dry aqueduct
Holding her breath
He won't return
Aug 14, 2020
Aug 14, 2020 at 11:07 AM UTC
I sat in the silence of a
Room eight times larger than I know
And I absorbed the six hundred
Empty chairs.
And I wrapped myself in
Miles of white fabric
And learned the feeling of
Sitting on an escalator.
The clean lines and plate-glass sunshine
Of Hermes's aqueduct
A secret passage everyone knows
You cannot fade into floral carpet.
It is a jaunty expression
To consume a length of sub sandwich
While strolling down an ally
Aware you may get mugged.
And over the years I have begun
To believe that teenage girls
Should not have camera phones
With their sneaky minds.
Somewhere along the line I learned
How to think, that silence
Is a virtue and precisely the best
Way to be alone.
I will never forget
The chandeliers of
Trapped Christmas lights
Painted in a warm glow.
Hook your arm in mine to
Stroll upon this concrete
And we will share this half
Gallon of lukewarm milk.
Jul 8, 2016
Jul 8, 2016 at 11:35 AM UTC
As we walked through the old church once more,
We saw little Andoni was there, sitting scared,
Asking us: have you forgotten our prayer?
He was angry and very square.
In the corner,
Shrouded by smoke,
Odilon Redon was there.
He watched on with an exalted air.
So we carried little Andoni to the aqueduct
And we sat in the aqueduct, square.
And we sat in the aqueduct until midnight,
Where we had first conceived of our prayer.
Mar 10, 2023
Mar 10, 2023 at 8:48 AM UTC
Look at the situation thus
We have appeared from out of a shell at dusk
Enjoy the twilight
As we seek the night and
We are not prone to turning to dust
Seek all those grandiose remarks
We manufacture them as the dog barks
Take them, cherish them
You will never guess from whence they stem
A distraction is called. O, the larks.
We spun our way around your blood.
Twisting and turning, creating an aqueduct.
Apparent to be in control.
Illusory, such as a verspertine stroll.
Although we created a cliché: your mind was dragged through the mud.
Bless you! Out, Satan out!
The demon has been removed from your snout.
Her allure lies in your head.
Let her enter, and we will not appear so dead.
Thus, stable and strained for now. Though, we will refrain for more than a bout.
Yes, child, we are still here and you are still a child.
For a moment, we successfully made you wild.
Still, this game digresses.
Rules are still the same, even as she undresses.
This dawn will pass, and our number redialled.
Nov 3, 2010
Nov 3, 2010 at 4:20 PM UTC
dissonant from the ground that ached
of frostbite,
fractured and mistress of
the Sargasso
she birthed the thin ghost of dawn
in legato
drawing the trembling line of
her lips.
fervent, the bulbous-born sky
washed her
in fat drunken clouds of
gray ships
climaxed in the aqueduct of
erratic dusk
and emerged as deity of
bagatelle and dust.
Jul 12, 2018
Jul 12, 2018 at 11:46 PM UTC
East River: The Many Calories in Water and Words
this weighty obsession, counting the energy
consumed and disbursed,
to be lean but not mean,
traverses into its third year
a late start does not forgive
over Forty years of transgressions, that damage,
sustained and in part irreversible,
yet I awake this Sunday morn,
all quiet on the East Side front, observing the East River flows
on the surface, contented and uncontested,
strongly bound for faraway Oceans unknown, and it tickles my
imagination that the rain from the nearby Adirondack and Catskills mountains might soon be quenching thy flora, fauna and your parched throats, confirming and conforming our connection and threading our interwoven tapestries, our unified aqueduct, carrying
with more than poetic words, but poetic water!
this notion sustains in multiple manners, and I deep drink the calm and the power as if it were,
for it is,
a daily vitamin,
calorie free,
God delivers
Delivering
us with
its contained and contentented potency,
to all
in equal dosage
and now the script finished,
the water imbibed,
this baptized, scripture loving
mind and body
as/is
wholly holy
refreshed,
as are we,
my friend
8:38AM
April 14, 2024
by the East River
Apr 14, 2024
Apr 14, 2024 at 9:26 AM UTC
No friendship is worth your marriage
Talking about the future with a stranger
Giving them your address
No friendship
is worth it
You do it
I do it
We all do it
The conversation
the future
Taking the dog out
in the garbage
Greasy hair
Inside other people's homes
Inside dresses
and churches
You do it
I do it
****** relationships with God
Weddings with too much champagne
cleaning up
Christian music and soap operas
where the **** have you been?
you do it too you know?
Chemistry and chemistry
aqueduct eyes
Watching midnight become noon
I don't think I have anything here
No leads.
The dropped out moan
before you sleep
Take a piece of the moon
in our sheets
close them tightly
We are standard-issued clowns
with Picasso painted hearts
With all the fine measurements
We both do it, under neon signs and
plastic candy stars
I'm just tired,
Mar 27, 2011
Mar 27, 2011 at 9:17 AM UTC
In basin
sprinkle lawns
sparingly though
pets are
favored too
in pending
season of
drought must
foretell quake
and herd
those ready
that rule
yet won't
squander a
role by
the river
an aqueduct.
Nov 28, 2016
Nov 28, 2016 at 12:26 PM UTC
for you, dearest, ever so shyly
i, (almost always) silently, sloshing (pertinently), will be like water
falling and falling repeatedly,
(like falls from felled rocks,
this foreverness of the dive)
rinsing and rinsing multipliedly,
(like rain tainting the already
stained glass in Barasoain)
freely, wanly, (like my hand
seeping through the aqueduct
of your body or
traversing the source of this stream)
but there is a brightness unmoving,
high rise of heat,
like water
i have dried out.
Oct 7, 2015
Oct 7, 2015 at 11:48 PM UTC
1
held against the mouth
sentenced cleaved to silence, what is around me
is all this is: wire. quartet of birds. aqueduct
as arrest and close range tap of rain on face
rippling in the eye foreclosed and reasoned is
this image's return -- what is it like to live
far away from home and not hear me say
regret as study of attitude? News carried
bombardment of inner cities. We were hesitant
to leave place and borrowed skin instead,
if not borrowed then grasped for, what is the answer? if coordinates lie, what are
we trying to discover.
2
held against the temple
not a barrel of a gun, but similarly, a chamber if not
a mouth breathing in sulfur. the day has spun
out of, and in between clipped reminders of
the calendar:
today's broken notes on the tablatures are
the daily. Do groceries. Pick the freshest fruit,
take the sour out of the scale. Gut the fish
and not word it so over the kitchen counter, I will
watch behind a clutter of earthenware and furniture. Might topple the glass
once and catch your attention. I do not deny your
effect on my soul.
3
today's forecast of rain is body staying in.
the children are seized by terror as scattered displays of lightning paint their faces
petrified with a lack of hue -- listen to the
intermittent, coarse static of the television
when it happens, your face ripe for arrest.
there is nothing to do in a home
holding its breath when you walk,
do not leave just yet. the water is rising.
it tells you to stay in. triple your presence
across the dining, rain as if out of the shower
barely drying yourself, leave water
i will not drink, only test swimmingly
a dream out of sleep and so real
a twitch of fish out of ocean.
4
outside you are no longer than the transit
of birds seeking canopies. Wind disrupts
the steady arm of cables. Slosh of water
from an oncoming vehicle as if beside the
sea crashing into me are waves,
What need is there when your mouth houses
water, your ******* warmth? Contrast as
habit of alternatives. In verbatim, this is how it
sounded from you, "We are very young.
Remember me this way."
Now i wish voices could be bodies. The next irreconcilable face as hearth.
Fingers as assuage, distance as dearth,
grasp if not borrow, translatable to
signal, my body heeding, fraught by taciturnity through the caught wind
through the furniture, once your body being groped for like any
other sundrenched day.
May 21, 2016
May 21, 2016 at 6:31 AM UTC
Don't call me a poet, because I'm nothing but an untitled crippled feeling
don't call me a poet, because I'm nothing but a person who smokes cigarettes to pass time
Don't call me a poet, because I'm nothing but a person who has notebooks full of past suicidal entries
Don't call me a poet, because I'm nothing but a person who wonders if faith should really be put on the shoulders of a sense I can't see
Don't call me a poet, because I'm nothing but a aqueduct of black and white emotions
Don't call me a poet, because I hate writing and remembering things that have affected me, but I don't know how else to vent so catch me spilling blood on paper as a form of expression
Don't call me a poet, because I'm nothing but a person who hasn't made a dollar of a passion he doesn't even think he's good at
I can't face the truth even if I had time for it, honestly
Oh me, faceless trains remind me how foolish I can be, I crave useless years to come for some reason, I question why things happen for a reason sometimes, but I've rose from what I'm feeling from under the umbrella; scared..
I've rose, and everything I'm about to remember these days, can go **** itself.
May 16, 2014
May 16, 2014 at 11:33 AM UTC
The LA aqueduct flows into the widest chasm on earth
Somewhere between Silverlake
And Hollywood
It seduces the kids
To come to her on buses
Streaming to the midnight mission
And pool
Swallowing in the dark
Earth and dirt and ashes
Feb 10, 2014
Feb 10, 2014 at 9:42 PM UTC
(20 minute poetry)
Past the barges easing along the canal, over the aqueduct,
******* the morning into my lungs,
flinging my satchel of schoolbooks because tomorrow never comes,
and then off to the islands for a pirate's day out,
tickling trout (the rainbow kind) lunch well deserved for the deserving mind.
I loved the river
the smell and the feel
the eels
the gulls
the turn of the tide
I took pride in it
knew every nook
every brook that loaned a little more strength to the length of it.
And then they altered it
sunk all my islands
dammed all the brooks
for ***** sake
can't they leave well enough alone?
The rivers not a home to be,
but it was a home for me
a long time ago.
Jun 18, 2016
Jun 18, 2016 at 4:54 AM UTC
upon this aqueduct of the narratives told,
we vowed to not listen to
poetic reminiscence of women
who would rather justify giving out
law only because jesus suffered justly -
than in greek innocent, concerning the
zenith of greek thought and the nadir
of hebrew behaviourism
under the romans odd -
would justify poetry over justice
as if caught ************ by their fathers...
who said after-the-act-poetry was
justice enough... but of course it wasn't.
Jan 27, 2016
Jan 27, 2016 at 10:18 PM UTC
Eleanor and Charlotte ,
drifting in sunlit reverie ,
see Marie Antoinette at her
easel
and the beginning of her
sorrow .
☆
How many cherubs , smiling ,
fixed scribes of shimmering
light ,
recline incumbent in vast marble halls .
☆
When ,
frozen in Time ,
two maidens in a doorway ,
pass a ceramic jug
between one another
for eternity .
☆
A man yells ,
seeing people back in time ,
that they were
too close to the chapel .
☆
Look , over a bridge ,
past an aqueduct ,
lay an unkempt meadow ,
where the mood was unnatural
and unpleasant .
☆
While behind dull meadow ,
the treeline was
as woodwork or tapestry .
☆
Flat and lifeless ,
as a shadow without
light or dark .
☆
No wind stirred the trees
and the two women
felt an unease of dreariness ,
as if walking in someone else's dream .
☆
" Wherefor the Trianon ?! "
The gardener stopped his labour
☆
" You will see a fine lady
in summer gown
and a large white hat . "
☆
And suddenly he was gone .
☆
Then , finally at the gate ,
a large man ,
in period costume
and born of a malevolent star .
☆
Dark cloak and
smallpox scarred ,
he stared forebodingly
under brim of black hat .
☆
Cronos , Father Time and
Death .
☆
The Future was stalling .
Oct 20, 2024
Oct 20, 2024 at 7:39 AM UTC
Off the weir where the water runs fast and the danger is near to the surface,
watching as fish out of water choke for a chance to get further upstream and
I envied their trials
sometimes I swim to the island and lay looking up at the blue sky, being warmed by the June sun until dry
and at other times I drift out to sea.
'jump off the aqueduct and you're fucked'
that's what they told me, but I jumped off it
anyway.
Salmon we lads poached to cook over the coals
and all of them goals that we set
which was like walking on water and not
getting wet,
but we thought we were Jesus
back then.
Jan 5, 2018
Jan 5, 2018 at 1:07 PM UTC