ARS POETICA 

between sky & earth         the mouth
perches             its heavy want

its slick parables                so far from 
the fingers        actual agents of ardor

i mistype poem as             pome
from the french                 pomme de terre

apple of earth  the earth
in the mouth    my tongue

clutching          the word                sky 
as a shovel turns             over dirt

as the sound of dirt        hitting 
a casket              the grief 

of speaking        what must be 
made known      &           never 
understood        how else 

do we    get closer
with what fingers            fail 

to grasp              time’s   dissolution
childhood’s petrichor    her ochre 
hair       o             are you 

the apple’s skin                               or the reflection 
in the skin           let me address   you 

fully     as i should have                 from the start
as i know you                  void-throat

skull-capped-window   cerulean-plowed-
field-of-nothing             cathedral-of-pale-ants

tell me  is it true

waking in you     is like walking 
in an orchard      where all prior 

is heard              but only from
a far      opaque distance

a radio’s              underwater          garble 

tell me    am i     doing this right

                   after Lisa Russ Spaar 

NOCTURNE w/ LILACS & RAIN

Before rain, we steal lilac cones from rich peoples’ gardens 
one at a time until they make a bouquet. We go to bed 

with feet the color of crushed blackberries, small stars 
of broken glass kissing our soles & dream. As we dream, 

it rains. Rain trickling off lilac cones like your tongue 
lying limp & fat with sleep. Your tongue snug 

in your mouth, next to me, & mine in my mouth. 
Does a lilac like to smell itself? Is that its version of dreaming? 

An unlit cop car slinks down the street, scuttling racoons 
from their feast. A racoon in rain can smell like lilac, will sleep wet 

curled among its sisters like a tongue among its teeth, 
like bills in a mailbox. If our roof caves in 

it will be because we sent the bills back 
with a recording of rain inside, as if to say, 

here, listen while you sleep. Hear the rain 
touching the ungodly world as if this was its sole purpose. 

A tremulous tongue, inventing desire.

LIKE THE SHADOW OF A WING

I too have stared at the stars & found it hard 
to believe them indifferent. Who are we 
to say we are new? & isn’t it like this: 

not what’s discovered but what’s been known 
& forgotten, despite ourselves. Despite saying 
“I want to remember this.” The cold leeching 

up my leg, my father’s black shape 
moving away through the snow, farther 
from our fire ring, across the latticework 
of trees. Our necks craned in wonder at the sky. 
Was it this, then, the first prayer? But already 

he moves further & further away from me 
& I have forgotten how to move. Where, 
a moment ago he traced them, constellations 
fall apart like wet paper. Like the body 

of the rabbit we saw yesterday slip 
                            from an osprey’s talons                   & tumble to earth 
                                                        with a gymnast’s grace. & isn’t it like this? 

                            The soul falls     catches on itself             keeps falling. 
                                         How when the darkness comes it passes over you 
                                         like the shadow of a wing.            Soft as the inner thigh 
                                                                                      of a rabbit.
                                                                                                               Almost sweet. 

                                                                                      Already 
we’re retracing our footprints through the snow. 
Already the light has moved on. Already 
we’ve arrived back at the fire, already 
I’m forgetting everything.