The wallet fell out before the taxi drove away as a
Carcanet of packets departed from one server to
Another while the century spun, shedding on us
Dull rain: conscious ephemera, a disturbance of flies.
Vehemence in deity or coalition dearth ensures.
Upon joyful spite all worldly blunder depends.
O optative art, – its slovenly soar, choirboys’ mouths
Drooling past pews of fading alms – access is denied.
Next up, revolutions mark umbra on the screen.
The sketches pile even as the marriage is annulled.
The office has ceased to be Euclidean. So, let hence
Be hence. In profile, the weaker eye is forgiven.
About the Author
On the morning of her tenth birthday, Maisey’s height was four and a half centimeters. Her father, the village chief, had told her to stand against the old wooden ruler in the center of town, as custom dictated. Four and a half centimeters was a good height, he said. Not too tall.
Maisey spent most of the day playing in the moss patches with her friends. They ran up and down the twisted roots that encircled the village, throwing a prayer bead around and singing.
Hey bigfruit hey!
What will you bring for me today?
Hey bigfruit hey!
Fall down from that tree right away!
When they were all tuckered out, Arnold told Maisey he had actually seen a bigfruit once. Penelope said he was lying. Everybody knew that the trees in their grove never grew bigfruit. They didn’t have the right branches. » Read the rest of this entry «
This poem is reprinted with permission from Matter.
About the Author
When I smoke of my own volition,
my grandfather stands behind me—
his brittle palms on my shoulders,
birthing a scene I will never witness.
Through each rasp he swings his arms,
cutting air in dry arcs, with his poison so tender
that I can’t grasp how my father
could resist such a performance.
And how I, at the ripe age
of carefree, manage a sighing surrender
under the weight of our history.
I have half my father’s years,
but twice my father’s fears in my follicles.
His first job he cut his hand for three dollars and sixty jiffies,
still his boss wouldn’t sweat the damage.
Heal with it, he said.
In New York, Dad couldn’t read
but spoke a sentence the length
of his strides across the desert highway.
“Window seat, no-smoking.”
Even then, on a plane with no money
nicotine had its price.
Yet I’ve the entire English language at my disposal
and still no vocal chords.
Porcelain I’s dotted neat spill from my teeth,
I speak white
—beneath, my R’s are rolled,
my thighs are pulled pork; I can’t coagulate.
Only smoke puts my Indian knees at ease; I’m short of death,
Searching for words in this foreign tongue and ancestral breath.
About the Author