Poetry

“Don't forget me. Mention my name now and then.“ —Willie Short, 36, Dishwasher, PWA: Houston XI      To keep my pains shaded, to divert the curious eyes, and let my body return to its initial dust, that state where sun and wind both, freely, come and go, is my last manly effort. I will stand clear…

There in a cage wordless then whispering in the basement where married theological students lived down where they kept spare chairs and baby carriages they lay down on smuggled blankets and stripped each other She pulled her shuddering into her mouth and she was afraid It had never happened before that opening except alone She…

Ducks fly over the pond. They fly between notes. My father in his uniform. Stars and stripes. Green like cricket grass. His hat lined. A shower curtain. In the evenings he'd come home his face rough. Stars. Rougher than memory. Pond mist. Like the geese landing on the pond. The woman a circle we come…

A small knot of conspirators, six oil drops, livid blues and blush, dabbed into a huddle of boots and cloaks and plumes the size of an unguessed scruple under the balustrade— a detail near the lagoon. So many bridges built over that water which flows forward into the moment flourishing its telltale signature at who's…

Our cock is boiling in a saucepan almost ready to become you and you ask those words into our raft bed Fuck me Please sweetheart Give it to me Please Let me O fuck O your wet cunt sweet Push it in my face Jesus Let me swallow you Take my pussy Suck O Suck…

Your eyes like a lake on a windy day. They wouldn't stay still. Your mouth like the mountains behind. I wanted to kiss that day, so soft. Your breath came louder and louder. We sailed. You held me. Watched my brown shoulder. We both were afraid. I kept pushing inside you. It began to rain….

A woman adorned stands out in a crowd of otherwise Camouflaged women, and takes from her shelf all manner Of potions and powers, the oils and slick pots of colors That hold electricity and confusion of mimicry That test the ties that bind deception to reality A woman in sundappled skin can mislead with mad…

Old black-and-white photos of musicians cover the walls at Alvin's Twilight Bar. A fire burns in the grate. The patrons are neighbors. I read the Free Press until a woman I know comes in for soup and beer. We listen to blues on the jukebox, drink a lot. So far talk is easy. Lady Day,…

for Leonard 1. Planets My body anabolic in sleep, my dream-mind fertile and easy, feeling no distress at missing trains—they're me but not mine. Awake I watch “Not-Mars” Antares fling planets back in an arc across the line of transit. Mars looms; Jupiter's a distant shout of white. Venus, name-laden, Mater Matuta, blazes cool in…