A Working Class Kid Goes to College

the floor     in the story     asked us to just be quiet
so we tip-toed around on the walls
wings tucked under our jackets
crowns having fallen imaginary
loose to space     past memory
the law of gravity undeniable as soiled undergarments

    outside the building toy animals
    a goat     a dog     a donkey
    an ox     a fox     a lynx
    a set of sixteenth century peasants
    plot revolution
    but none of them looks in the mirror for very long

the little black and white dog
the kind you see in roman mosaics
felt modern     tinted sunglasses now
and wagged his tail waiting
for those bulls with wings     those spirited ancestors
to greet him at the door

    his paw nails are longer now
    he can walk walls

    their tales of castles and finery
    were still cute to him     cute

    he knew all their palaces by name and reputation
    he didn’t know he’d never been inside one

these gods
he’d venerated for what seemed like thousands of years
could teach him to savor the birds
that he knew he could catch up with now
but for the uneasiness in his belly     still puffed up with dog food

he was known     he was sure later     for his foul breath

from Auto Bio (2010)

Expectant Buildings

last night in a swirl of dream
i walked with field gnomes
in the vacant lot where i grew up

they smiled so comfortably
in their small quick strides beside me
suddenly two singers called to them
from separate second floor balconies
and the entire slum around us was gone

so sing to me in the voice of the ocean
    that carries cities of fish in its tide
sing to me in the voices of sea bottom sand
    that the water smoothes into cloth in its ebb
sing to me in the voices of expectant towns
    that i hear near their infancy in the slow rolls of water
sing to me in the foam of the tide
    that rolls in like the lifetime of butterflies

so i found myself happy
in the songs of the gnomes
in the meadow where i grew up
in the bright field of flowers
with no nightfall
in dream

from Auto Bio (2010)

For My Parents

drawing their dreams
in carts
behind them

like horses
forever pulling bricks
for their own stable

making dragons
of small 
rubber-armed windmills

finding a field
too green
a road too rough for stopping

they want to continue
one generation
after another

here

on the same road
to the same place
just over
the same hill

from Auto Bio (2010)

Finding Bones

some day a dog will get loose
find the patch of land just far enough past the yard
dig them up     the bones     the ones
the police looked for for twenty years
before they got back into their cruisers
and headed for the home planet

the force of narrative will goad the dog
into carrying the bones home
despite their glittery brightness
their strange     really strange     taste in his mouth
and he will guard them as his own
despite the will of the pack leader in the house

even when you’re small some things are your own
a dog could think that     a dog can think
and they’ve found that the genes that make small dogs small
don’t make them think they’re small
the class system here is purely physical
and you don’t have to think about it
if no one else can steal your treasures

from Auto Bio (2010)

The Second Breath

my brain is getting painted this dull universe
your shy nondescript     taking darts
and your check     your time     say
mommy can't we buy a we?

rutabagas here go lift the day
sweating a car outside
idling badly as a scientist
can only say wow when go crash down the hall

she stopped for an instant
conversation in the tar pit with invisible flesh
words no longer     they go
and you dance

you dance on tires
all the dolphins peopled by career oranges object
what wonders must be across the ceiling in my living room
what wonders must be across love overcame them all
a huge leap      houses zoom in
stop conversation
houses zoom in      a huge leap
she turns says what wonders you have in your head
at ground     move
your sky neutral
you see together
you dance

from Oedipus' First Lover (2009)

Good Earth

this is the excuse of pleasant folks:
medusa's head        bound by a silk stocking
is kept incognito inside a desk
open hands clap until they are housebroken
and cyborgs with dog heads
sniff
around perimeters of fish ponds
dreaming           of the blood          the blood

in the sunset come and go
singing of daily mop and glo

o dead god buried          in the wheatfields of south dakota
what commercial trumpets your theme song?
do you rise          like a missile          at night
wet-dreaming of marge the plumber?
does someone          polish the end of your metal
each dawn to keep your thoughts brilliant and clean?

we are all multicellular now
phone us

we are still searching the plains
looking for medusa's teeth
planted
inches deep in the soil

from Oedipus' First Lover (2009)

Swimming Pool Rotunda

be crowded within yourself
empty pass by pools of televisions broadcasting antique profundities
sing along with shepherds who’ve reburied their sheep in house twine
watch the aching of stone at your local amusement park

and what if other people too 
will be walking blind in swimming pools?
after long walks inside clouds
radios run antelope down their own antennae

the magic     opportunity     a new skill
a new memory in the same place as the old one
the steamboats of a leather navy in your coat pocket
you can reorganize yourself as a truck bearing crabapples
sounds lubricated under the steamroller of belief
it’s so seductive     a debt of bone     a cloudscape softened to cotton

from Oedipus' First Lover (2009)

A Jealous Universe

his hips and she was suck
he comes into your party
i could see muscles twinge
and i know
leans against a wall

my landed neck i watched in her thighs and calves
excited and she in this new fingers
i could understand
my landed i neck i watched
she was possessing
talk

i could see him
i could understand
soon
he doesn't move
she was his eyes shown early
he was possessing
i would have

like tired eyes and starved strong
people     and some
began to leave
i felt     each stroke in their van yet
knowing the routine
begin to wonder about the cars
the long feet saturday an apparition
i could see muscles twinge
no routine     heard you cough once
they were possessing the walk
all of us alone     the desert sea
on the lawn  

  
  
  

from Oedipus' First Lover (2009)

So Yesterday

so yesterday you tamed a cat into a lion
hung a picture of the world on a wall of stars
drove the whole road home from there
to your own rooms that are paradise
and invited it in for a drink

today the sky is so blue and distant
and yet so friendly
a miracle that comforts you
with its peace and its vastness

Its Elegant Steel Cage

behind the door     plored is advisable
like that died at the wheel     evidence with caged lips
but hats will be wallpaper     the original stables entering a cloud
where princes and elevators built abattoirs within waiting rooms

the voice     which literally cause were gamekeepers
is a journey into the basement 
of a lime-green monkey hidden in the cupcakes
snap that picture and crude pants depart
that means fewer meds year round and    hey     you
more coffee      i’m brewing chewing gum    
floating foundation     we did some myself upward
he passes the supermarket 
speechless within shock and admissible speed

we were holidays then    back when an attempt at charm
taking      saying thank you very much 
that repeating riff for thirty-eight years 
always adding her strange boil
was quite the poker escalator especially when the door broke down
less a mean spirited wearable wreck 
than a jerk with finders’ fees designed 
to prevent earthquake damage      the door?     
it’s still there     glad you asked
they tittered beside the drinking thank you
and the curtain went up and wouldn’t it be for water this time
but it’s a bright sunshiny day     always has been
and the apple reflects     so      mooooooo

from Oedipus' First Lover (2009)