LATE FRAGMENT OF STEPHEN DEDALUS

Dreamt I was love's 

last living vampire; 

loneliness 

was my familiar—

but for once, my lust 

and your concern came 

teetering back into 

phase with each other. 

As I opened my mouth 

to bare my teeth 

and claim consubstantiality 

of words and reality, 

your lips—which were wet 

and pressed close enough 

to, at least temporarily, 

shut mine up—

felt like not so much 

of a big deal by contrast, 

and, as such, were 

all the sweeter. 

 

LET'S FACE IT

We love to hurt 

the way a baby loves 

to look around 

after it has 

just fallen down 

to make sure its mother is 

paying attention. 

*

Our preferred form 

of diversion 

is a pleasure 

deferred—

a day 

without timestamps;

a poem 

without all the troublesome 

words;

a "referred" pain 

as an analgesic 

substitute for the real thing.

("Better them 

than us," we exclaim.)

We like our 

soft feelings

like we like our hard truths: 

registered across town 

in seedy hotel rooms

under nom de plumes. 

*

We are not into 

"pushing the easy button."

We are into regretting 

easy buttons don't exist. 

TIME OUT OF MIND

                   —after Emily Dickinson 

"Forever," we've been 

told, "is composed of nows,"

but unfortunately, now 

is also flooded 

with forevers—

and the only way 

we know of to endeavor 

to cross over 

from one specious present 

to the ill-defined next is 

to caulk the twin wagons 

of hope and regret 

and attempt to ford

(via brute summation) 

the biblical river

of pleasure-

cum-pain 

which has burst the cheap 

dam of this 

same time and place 

and laid waste 

to that oasis from horizon 

to horizon.

But the hell of it is:

the place to which we 

think we might escape 

is just another maddeningly

familiar-looking junction 

between that which can 

neither be found 

nor forgotten.

DISPUTED ZONE

Even though you've doubtless 

come here for 

a respite from the storm, 

I am sorry 

to say that you've been 

misinformed; 

there's a despot 

in the white space 

and guerillas 

at the margins.

There are sergeants 

drilling crackpot logic

and halftracks of gibberish 

and incoherence 

patrolling with menace 

the perimeters of this— 

and every other poem. 

From the epics of Homer 

to the white chickens 

of the Imagists, 

it's shelter, some direction, 

or a mantra you're after, 

but the truth is 

it's widdershins 

the moment you enter—

and you hold no cards 

within these borders. 

Consider, dear reader, 

the predicament you're in. 

FINAL SOLILOQUY OF THE INTERIOR EX-PARAMOUR

In more ways than one, 

your face is 

like the moon. 

But never mind 

the milkwhite 

beauty of its cheeks

or the taut graceful curve 

of their bones; 

I have seen, unbidden,

the way it goes 

through phases 

to keep a ruined 

and dark side hidden—

and, having zoomed 

out to widen 

my view, how it shines 

with a light 

that is not its own. 

KEEP 'EM COMING

Despite the enormity 

of what or who 

we've lost, 

clouds 

out of nowhere 

fledge and caper; 

they swell and cleave

and bud and splatter 

with all the deathless disregard 

of immaculate 

sprites for whom beauty 

and whimsy 

are all 

that matters—but 

have no cost. 

How else would you explain 

our utter failure 

to prepare—even

to believe 

that the worst has 

come for us? 

ABSTRACTION

For some 

time now, sallow light 

on the spring/winter border 

has been blanching all those

photos hung too close 

to the window. 

The scene might read 

as tragic to the momentary 

witness, but 

in the relentless eternity 

of now, to temper

is a kindness; 

you can look at the past 

as if through stained 

cathedral glass—that is, 

without wincing 

at all the details, or facing-

off with facts.