Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Collapsible Opera Hat

Put on your bracelet of moths
and rise like the hint of the kamikaze's
cologne lingering above the gasoline
soaked jacket you wear; we should
stopping dating ourselves and date someone
who can unearth love in this borrowed
and spelunking universe.  I'm stuck
with these claustrophobic fumes rising
off the furtive heads of swallows, which
are harmless unless descending into a
a pleasure boat.  Listen,  I was once
a vapor myself and my whole shtick
desperately hung in lonely bands
around the eyes like a mask.  But wait,
you can lick whatever mask I wear
I don't mind.  And in turn I'll show you
circling like the darkness of a musty
collapsible opera hat, a brave solution
tampered with braver indecision.

Bells

for Agha Shahid Ali
(d. December 8, 2001)


I was your trump card
and dotted the inner ring of tiny bells

bells...bells...bells...you wrote
and pomegranates

Listen...when the mayfly
when he is young
with water in his wings
flies gently backwards to his mate.

What an evanescent gesture.
And every poem returned to you backwards for years

Still the amputated fingers of boys
touched you in a dream.

Exiled, we leave one world
and go on to the next.
Like round silver plates encrypted with curry

Words can never be overused.
I will be your happy little Indian
that you will be, at last,
writing about, for at least,
the next few hundred years.


When Darling Opens Up Her Eyes

A lake that hasn't been skated
on.  A telephone ringing out its
desires.  A kiss on the face of
a dog. A firecracker a cut above
a roman-candle or star shooter
A smaller world, more likable
like a small boy named Benny
A tiny spark inside a whale
A flicker among sparrows
A taxicab plowing into a johnny blah
Then the whole theater darkens
A waiter politely removes our dinners
from the check.  A tiny hole the size
of an O opens and we jump
in afraid to tear it. We put our slickers
on because we have them
It is rocky so head towards the rocks

(Dip of Heavy Wings etc...)

Now that New Orleans sleeps
on the floors of changing
rooms one looks under
at the smiling women
like a spectator actually
feeling the magnificent
wave of the lit world beyond
the drowned (dip of heavy wings etc..)
Just sticking out one's neck
could mean an indelible
toasting.  But we peep out
of sheer joy.  Out of giddiness
like taking a cookie
and running upstairs
In other words this is
pealing off the label
Embracing the possibility
of spoonfuls of beauty
the size of a river
The delta expands
and more houses fall in.

All Life is like this Afteroon

All life is like this afternoon on your young sandy face the weight of the stars the body tasting like snow a slipcover of communic...