Poetry

Parked on the rock of the kitchen floor that the landlady put in herself, stone by stone, uneven, smooth, buttery, I talked—I guess loudly (it was a party, and there was wine) with a woman the color of wheat, even her eyelashes, and she was worried, she was saying, about the execution coming that morning…

1. Kissinger in black-tie shuffles to the town car idling at the museum complex edge between where the glum Pei pyramid rises and the gardens begin. “Is that—” I say, and “Yes,” says Jim, baby in his arms, me shoving the empty stroller to get home by naptime. Nobody notices, clicking at each other through…

I watched you walking up out of that hole All day it had been raining in that field in Southern Italy rain beating down making puddles in the mud hissing down on rocks from a sky enraged I waited and was patient finally you emerged and were immediately soaked you stared at me without love…

It isn’t dependable as a guide when it flows From a grudge against the body, but consider How helpful it proved in prompting the god Who revealed himself to the prophet Amos To gag when he sniffed the savor rising From temple altars. The smoke of sacrifice Stank in his nostrils when the fires were…

J. M. W. Turner’s “Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead  and Dying, Typhoon Coming On” (1840) How it is That up is known Here, outstretched umber hands Punch through An ocean’s concave mirror                                     from Death’s inverse                                    Universe                             —But that’s Not in this view That Wasn’t me We say now To the flame-shaped…

What’s it like now to be shot in the foot by yourself, when you were aiming elsewhere and didn’t want   any kind of trouble? How else could you frustrate yourself more, what with your foot oozing blood,   and the gun smoke clouding the air so you can’t think, and that bird you wanted…

mistranslation after “Fellah” by Taha Muhammad Ali   You: Beethoven I mean to say: Mr. Beethoven I don’t get it: I spend the day removing obstacles, Me and all my neighbors, we’ve covered all the bases But behind our backs, on the phone, the sun still going up and down There are those who hurt…

    i. There are hands around a small neck. Climb in closer. Without line these your limbs, gills, wrist a small cut on a mid-season day. Now the squirrel arabesques limb to limb dropping      not falling.     ii. Gated all awake. Eaten all your conflagrated hate. Pulled down toward.    Pull down toward. This your cord….

By ten o’clock she’s cleaned the house and can measure bourbon into her cup. Who will save her now? No answer. The fetus flips and scoots inside her belly, then sleeps as quiet as the lamb that lies down with the wolf, its sovereign other. Improbably in that tiny Brooklyn apartment, Nina’s baby pulls cells…