we live
in a nervous system
shy regards now a bond
static as panic
we live
where time invites neglect
monied generations
under hot blue skies
we live
in all-cap sentiments
rhetorical as pushing buttons
fragments of sunken places
volume won the day
what was said
had to be abandoned
because more was coming
this universe was not built
to accommodate more than one sun
call me when
the Afghanistan war
is over
fog obscures the depth behind it
from my side of this wall
I am only a body
& the sky is a milky blue
I quietly compose performative debts
unchecked — they form treacherous habits
when written they s t r e t c h smooth
I’ve ritualized these (now) ceremonial feelings
& marinated in their bone-heavy broth
as panicked days continue to pace themselves
“but i am running into a new year and i beg what i love and i leave to forgive me”
— Lucille Clifton, from I am Running Into a New Year
Always, an airplane in the sky. Our big, beautiful world is dying. We string colored lights in windows. This time of year requires letting go of what cannot be undone. The freeway flows forward, always. Birds sing in tune with worn out brakes of city buses. Today I will laugh. Where does the grotesque fall away and where is the real? Knees. Ribs. Pelvis. Hips a spacial reference to another’s manipulation. My body woke me in the middle of the night. I wasn’t sure if it was fair to tell you this truth. I disassociate enough to protect my sensibilities and made myself small to accommodate your vision of a world that owed you. I kept my mouth shut for fear of casting a shadow on your carefully carved out spotlight. I need new vocabulary to describe this headstrong ritual. Joy and excitement is replicable but they won’t be to scale. Yesterday I watched a woman kiss pigeons. Gently and respectfully, she kissed the bravest on their greedy beaks. In a sea of bread crumbs and feathers, she shared her love with those who surrounded her. Come back into it. My body won’t relax. I pick up the slack. Evening’s receiving light follows me home.
Always to shine,
to shine everywhere,
to the very depth of the last days…
-Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky
celestially speaking, we all belong to a restrictive social class
cumulative in our longings, we render dependency as emergencies
[how romantic to feel each other’s interdependent commitments]
we take our love-starved coordinates and plot collective orbits
moving at the textured pace of gravity’s grace, time fragments
do not worry, this scattering happens every year. remember?
what will you pick up and carry into tomorrow? the new year?
Do me a favor this morning. Draw the curtain and come
back to bed.
Forget the coffee. We’ll pretend
we’re in a foreign country, and in love.
Raymond Carver, last stanza of “The Road”
There’s an urgency when you wake up in darkness. Instinct tells you to trust that light is coming. The sky opened a hazy lilac. Morning shadows sharpen. I’ve misinterpreted the danger inherent in matter cannot be created nor destroyed. Navigating productions, stilted formations misunderstood as lyrical responses, becomes a performance. Often, soothing a distraction.
I learned early that soft touches were to be saved for moving someone to confession, then towards salvation. For all those end-of-days Sunday warnings, I am not prepared. This is a special kind of denial, an abject version of faith.
“We should have known” has signaled subtle shaming. Didn’t you hear all those rumors?
The moon is new. At the moment, there is no wind. My body remembers this fear. My sense of distance expands in the pink layered light.
I’ve kept this on the tip of my tongue, at the rim of my mouth, inside my lungs sweet like a curated secret. I tried to write around the noise but this is the silence that found me.
“Variety, multiplicity, eroticism are difficult to control.” — Barbara Christian, The Race for Theory, 1988
the world has been ending
since humans monetized time
selling stories elegant as tree rings
interrupted only to loop
together, attention affects gravity
softly gathered in quiet
found in the folds of endurance
atoned — we focus on the migrating season
elegant in its infinite chase
an autumn sun rose ripe
peachy explosions
light bloomed dandelion bright
take my hand, let’s walk
to the edge of town
I promise our sky opens
if you listen to its longest shadows
Our days contain the same hours despite abbreviated light.
Fevered images imprinted on soft flesh remind
this planet orbits a beloved and nuclear star.
Sorcery or science, that’s not for me to declare.
I record the sky every morning to create fragments of an unseeable whole.
Daily witness a veritable surge measured against distance as response.
I stop when I remember your happiness is not my responsibility.
That’s the small print of being in relationship to you.
We’ve burned through time by excavating the past.
I warned you verb tenses are subjective when coupled
with mutable concepts of time. Didn’t you hear that echo?
In suspension, I ate my tongue and swallowed our blood.
I know how much you appreciate a dramatic and proper exit.
god is absent these manic days
and still, we try to be our best selves
(even my plants have grown inches)
find your lazy gaze focused
there is forgiveness in being temporary
(pink light burns morning fog)
abstract detachment feels like coping
dreamy summer days tumble us smooth
(bone white clouds break open)
We used to ask what might come after the orgy — mourning or melancholia?
Jean Baudrillard, The Illusion of the End
I’m trying to remember if spring always starts out this slow. Cherry blossom photos start popping up online. Winter’s scandals begin to blend into sales for sandals. Days stretch beyond blue twilight.
We desire soft power, wash out our ghosts, and pleasure places we neglected.
Us dandy men and hard women eventually repent the same—on our knees. Quietly, let us break down to the softness of desecration. Vandalize public anticipation, then escape into too much artificial light.
