I’m tempted to
borrow tragedy;
the red wall,
the long fall.

The long haul &
the don’t look back
are needle to the
plow to the groove:

peculiar music
of the pastoral
neatly tailored
plot I chose.

Plot originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2010-03-08.

Haloes when you grin,
there’s no denial.
Two worlds define the
edges of your smile.

Smile originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2010-03-04.

The beam bursting from your head
is a particle, is a wave;
you are the collapsing form
I cannot unsee;
the antibody lives on:
unapproachable parallel.

Bird originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2010-03-04.

This is how everything is. No shoulder for the pack; the pack is anyhow carried. Passive voice. Active voice. Does it matter? Maybe. Or not. Lack of pronouns. The actors are frozen in place; the board is set. Not playing but being played. Brief bursts of energy. Movement. Choice. Illusion?

Look to windward. Stand still. Wind moves. Or wind stands still. Who moves? Invisible hands; so many.

Hands, Windward originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2010-02-23.

Missing originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2010-02-08.

Are you bursting with day
suddenly from grey on grey half-life?
Tell me how this will and that will
not steal you.

Ballast & Theft originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2010-01-26.

There she goes,
a sudden rippling
unfolding of
wings.

She can’t stay
in the cradle
forever.

Dream Song originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-12-05.

Value originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-12-05.

Toddle on and we’ll find our sea feet
to the rise and swell of brine and stomach:
this retreating continent where I first voided
her saltwater kisses into a shallow trough.

Saunter on and we’ll cross swords and whiskey
shots across the bow like ships in the night:
the stern warning blinking dashboard red,
the iceberg, and the imminent disaster.

Titan originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-11-30.

I was so small. An infinite circle, but so small.
A perfect circle, an artifice, an unnatural symmetry.

If I outgrew the circle or if it shrank within me,
I don’t know. It is a tiny, significant, imperfect memory.

I remember stars like eyes askance circling overhead
while I stalked my claim. How I struggled to bring it down!

I remember the jaws closing round my neck.
I remember the tubes and vessels full of vacuum.

I remember feeling so small while the vice tightened.
The circle right around my few remaining waking moments.

I remember being blind and deaf and sleepless for a while,
but also I remember the knives. I remembering being cured.

And I am so small, the happiest infinite smallness.
Joy at being found dead and wanting death.

I remember the first time I realised it,
and how I fell into it and disappeared.

Circle originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-11-27.

I’m sure. Petty theft, I have stolen
the day we met, added a semicolon

and squirreled it away. Another occasion,
another chance to complete the equation.

Meanwhile, I’ve examined the debt
and it’s interesting. Not due yet,

but soon. Perhaps. Diagrams and charts.
Games of chess, of pool, of darts.

Time turns many slights to wounds.
Bastard child, not due yet, but soon.

To Have And To Hold originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-11-25.

You’re an imaginary person
now a figment, a
small, dark fruit
of the past.

You’re the monument
reposed in restless
unexpected
erudition.

Mime the gap–
arms spread like
wings. This far–
no, further.

White Witch originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-11-25.

This is the me that was,
I explain to lookers-on,
the horrified ex-soldiers
huddled in groups,
in church basements,
in bunkers, in bars,
vainly trying to forget
themselves.

This is the is that was me,
they shout into my wake,
where here lies the hero,
the one who said war
workes in mysterious ways,
who came back covered
in medals and pine slats,
who never woke screaming
from his unshakable sleep.

I was left standing,
a monster, the pride
of lions, of eagles, of iron crosses.
They wouldn’t look me in the eye,
instead inspecting my feet
for the conventional clay.
I regret nothing, I whispered
as they wept. I regret
nothing.

The Hero originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-11-25.

A barber down the street notices
smokestacks coughing viscous
phlegm out over the lake.

Your shift and a chunk of your year
lopped off; can’t afford
the other half,

and so you retire with
bad hair and a bad back
to your parents’ house.

Should have been a lawyer,
she says, and the
litigation begins.

Seams originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-11-23.

Not as described–
fault-tolerant
shatter-proof
card-pile.

I stood like a monument
to myself, posed
the question, broke
the mould.

Monument originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-11-23.

Reservations originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-10-10.

Eight years later the wry
spaces bent intentionally
wrench you from here
to there.

A kid on the street shooting
caps, false bulletins. Soft.
So far the reading of his
holey punctuated

invisible braille. The divisible
zero. Fear no evil.
Lose your carriage train
of thought.

Items bought in haste and
returned at leisure.
Code breakers
know.

Code Breakers originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-10-10.

It was a different version of this sky.
It is evening, I am projected into
the air on an impossible concrete pad:
I am always afraid I’ll find myself
in the process of jumping off.

This is a different version of a lie
I have told myself many times.
Everything balanced: nothing falls.
And then my body, which knows
no such thing, does it.

Doing It originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-10-06.

Of course, the logistics
are an issue what with
the extra shifts
I hate to take this
week.

So… you think we are trying too hard to make something happen that is not there?

Yes, and you can tell
because the best songs
fell out of my mouth
like sand. Hand
me some.

I just got home and got your email, I had made different plans anyways for tonight.

It should be the end
of every sentence,
that we just missed on
trains that almost kiss
that way (and this).

Do you even have any friends like that? I have at least one or two.

What you want is to be
the ear that bleeds freely
for free. Eye that reads
me. I’m touched,
see?

Flan originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-10-02.

Well. Chosen times don’t fit
bullshit tailored in arrears.
Your accountants quit
when you wrote off ten years.

The dented email didn’t arrive
in one piece. It ruined the day,
clattering, only half-alive:
you always get your way.

Email originally appeared on Elsewhere in Dreams on 2009-09-30.