Barberous

when strings embellish time

the time for talk is over 

silence is cultivated, the means

towards heaven are coded

with erasure, life is in session

domestic, crestfallen, the audience  

writhes like worms under the tarot

when the reading turns ominous 

it is a lover’s wet eye shining 

like a disharmonious tetractys 

lodging power against our broken lips

as if we could resist, or draw the bow across 

a forgiving note, we turn away 

molto adagio to face 

the question eating us, how much 

do we gain with a hush

or lose by shouting 

over the autumn mums

resolve then, to sink quietly 

into dispassion, the conductor 

leads the way and stops 

just shy of the open gate

dVerse: Adagio for Strings

Test Prep in Triptych

 i. 

slow there, and here expand 

common strands 

run steep and wide, the strange

vocabulary very academic

like the smell of an ink pen

your finger, use it to trace 

the craftsmanship of a cube

then cup the sphere 

where you stand

strain and maintain, turn

to your neighbor and explain

the endless 

compulsion to explain

ii.

fractions are soft, a loss

without total loss

the algebraic expression

is an opportunity to set right

the brokenness in the world, to reveal 

and make known the exact question 

know this and then gaze 

into the brain of incarnation

a notion now in breathing meat

iii. 

think of what you

expected to learn

this is the how

I leave you 

to solve for why

Poetics Tuesday: To ma'am/sir

An Inebriate Staggers into a Thomas Kinkade

the plumes of smoke in frozen gentility puff from the chimney autumnal tufts of filtering trees lit yellow as if in late life sun the viewer never certain from where the light comes does it radiate from under the arched stone bridge     rendered soft with moss, an improbable fantasy for us and the drunkard to stumble upon, he knows the disappearing families pulled their thickest fabrics     over the buttery windows, he knows why he tugs at the stray threads of his damp socks he won’t stay long, they are aren’t convinced he’s only here for respite, for rest, forest and he cracks himself up like a thick layer of ancient paint, when it’s time     and god knows when, he’ll bundle his ruffles gather his mumbles within his reddish voice and flow away from the idyllic swan-poisoned waters, assured that     for a moment, he made the picture more perfect with him in it and nobody saw it

The Sunday Whirl: Wordle 773

Trending

doles out enough words

to tease the snap, to blow up

the likes, the secret men 

by the tens

scrolling by, stopping

for twelve beats

to pinch zoom the titles

of books on her night stand

they run their eyes over her 

mother’s heirloom quilt 

fashioned in times when to turn

a man’s head, all one needed 

was lace and churn

it’s what she does 

to curate imaginary 

numbers, those viral

passers by asking 

to see all of her, working

the long division

of labor illuminated 

by a ring light, she calculates 

her next move under a skin 

of their adjectives

Friday Writings #243: By the Numbers

Terrestrial

on the radio I heard a man, just a man 
declare that life right here began

with an intergalactic rock that slammed
into Earth, a soaring rock 

on which some amoeba, a stamp

of lichen, a stray cat hitched it 

until that boop of life met a drop 

of ocean and coughed 

so here we are, milking it

laboring it to the molten core  

biting down and tickling Sisyphus 

until under his rubble 

we decompose, waiting 

for our cosmic dust 

to surf a germ onto another stone

for an encore performance

dVerse: Lyric Petrologies

One More Instruction Before Visiting Earth

after James McRae 


create some form 
of expression to excite 
our sixth sense, amuse us
in a fourth dimension

we humans get nostalgic
for something new
to be nostalgic about, ditto 
with romanticism and 
melancholy, whatever

tricked out rhyme hums in your nitrogen
lay it on our carbon base, fair warning

we have a history
of crucifying guests, yet 
we starve for novel figures 
to glow in our synapses 

tell you what, just elevate 
and lead us to our mirrors

we’ll see ourselves in you, 
as we always do, I only ask that
you be a just and loving god

dVerse Open Link Night #414

How to Speak of Strength

when you stand
before a villainous statue
and a child looking up 
in awe pitches a coin

at its feet, speak 

only of the raw materials, how pure 

they must have been, imagine

 

the maker’s tilted eye, speak 

only of skill and the years 

in the studio chiseling 

at unforgiving stone to create 

such intricate medals 

how the solid ribbons 

seem to sway, marvel 

in the details 

of its heavy boots

how the proud creator

must have bristled

as he finished

in time, you will sculpt 

two hearts in the contours

of a more precious art

Friday Writings #242: Perspective

Burglary

Initially, it is exciting and dreadfully rich

to tiptoe into a kitchen, you know

 

where they all keep their Sunday knives

the drawer of fast food forks, a distorted blue

sippy cup collapsed and weeping

warm milk like a Marian icon abandoned 

by progress, stop and care enough

to dissect the tea towel draped 

over the counter–Mystic, it’s the Key West 

wadded up on a Wednesday morning

landscape that betrays the lateness 

of their exit, the hieroglyphic Cheerios 

and lukewarm scrambled bits

you suspect that in every house 

with laundry there is a damp apron, the breast 

pocket open, asking you to enter, to touch

your mother who slipped away, and in that way 

you won’t leave

empty handed, or alone

dVerse: Pulling poetry from the landscape

Another Rodeo

when the bottom rose

to hit me, I took it

like a champ, I suffered

in the drink of you

until the escape was too hot

    and your trail collapsed

        like calendar ash

I begged the dust for a minute

    the moon for a toast, I begged

        to overtake you, to name you

            because I remain nameless

I ran to touch the air 

    you walked through 

        as if I could catch your wild scent

            against my face, or be gently folded 

                into your gravity, yes

I was wrong for the right

    reason, the revelation

        that you were

that you were 

fucking with my head

    which was just trying

        to cinch the distance

            between have and haunt

kicked me like a hymn

    left me gasping, braying

        among strangers, the rawest

            me flayed out behind 

                all of you, just too brief

I begged your pursuit

     to hurt me, to hurl me full stride 

        into a wayward beginning

Friday Writing 241: Change

The Milepost

Once in a lifetime, you will exchange 
your boots for sparks, and flare
into Orion which you said was 

really you, and you gunned it 

like a false start, leaving

your belt unbuckled

which was a blast, your bow

was an empty bottle slung 

from the hip, which hit the ground

and the glass became shards

which is like stars for people who

never look up, which means they wont 

see you up there dancing highway 

to the danger zone or the three dots

you left in your wake, twinkling into

exhaustion or wasting away in 

the overwhelming dark, which is 

love in a dead language

dVerse: Once in a Lifetime

This New Covenant

Jesus dressed my poor angel 
in unattended weeds

and thus the lowest ebb 

of perverse suspicion 

flooded the summer 

and thus we fell

among cryptic texts

unanswered calls

and nights turning 

into suspicious morning 

routines of angry gardening

together tearing 

at the hearty stalks 

and thus the bed 

became cold in absentia 

and rich with fingers 

and thus a thin fire culled our lives 

vigorously, almost professionally 

so therefore Jesus spoke

a new wood, sending me 

a preserver, a new soil 

my impoverished angel 

tossing seed, so I could eat alone 

be punishingly alive

tending to a new shoot

Friday Writings #240: Despair and Delight

Like the Weather: Part II

germinating from the ennui, you shake 

the quiver from your head

can you weather, or shiver 

with outdoor angels

they are in you, above you 

that feed, the play

the force 

is the same as a chime

waking from its stillness

to trill its voice 

as it remembers

yes, the morning 

is a cold hard color 

slip it on, the earth 

will have its noon

with sunflowers

steeped in gray

you’re not of this pillow  

drag your coal outside

feel the sound

of today’s wet lips

pecking at your skin

 dVerse Poetics — Have You Ever Seen the Rain?

Dusk for Dawn

floating rests on a polarized light
substance mirrors illumination 

in a dream, firing up
unavailable rods, clouded cones

unphotogenic in a sense
omnidirectional, but static 

can’t trust it, the chlorophyll 
bit dust, it’s de-luxed

swap that green hill 
for a pasture bathed 
in colors unimagined

Friday Writings #233: “set another goal … dream a new dream”