Library

my eye attends to you

my eye attends to you
from all angles
a feverish lover
a valiant friend

for your skin my heart once called
beat after beat
heavy in breath
my air drawn from your air

extensions of a
breathless exhalation:
an altogether unique language
primal and patterned;

fractions of what remains
divisible by time
resolve
a portal

triangulated
like a whisper that pierces
an Oasis
through the noise

2020-2022

il mio sguardo si occupa di te

il mio sguardo si occupa di te
accudendoti in ogni tuo aspetto
un amante appassionato
un amico fidato

cercando la tua pelle il mio cuore in passato
anelava
battito dopo battito

affannandosi

il mio respiro aspirava fiato dal tuo stesso respiro
estensioni di una espirazione senza fiato:
un linguaggio unico,
completamente primordiale, schematico;

pezzi di ciò che rimane
divisibile nel tempo
rivela
un varco

mappato
come un soffio che trafigge
un’ Oasi
mormorando attraverso il rumore

2020-2022

Translation by Giuliana Allen

breathing

the air tastes
like
cold water

parsed

fast and
obsequious

agile as sound
under water

errrr

orrrr

under tow
the ocean at night

just

beyond

the waves

2009

il respiro

l’aria sapora
d’
acqua fresca

analizzandolo

veloce e
onnipresente

agile come suono agile
sott’acqua

errrr

orrrr

tira sotto
l’oceano di notte

solamente

oltre

le onde

2022

Translation by Giuliana Allen

the owwwwwwww

I am ageless
I am amorphous

I am a suspended solid

I see in black and white
I confide in art

I assume the role of a dozen men
I am a woman when needed

I tell the truth
I tell the lies

I own little
I want for nothing

I resound in isolation
I endure your silence

I fear starvation

I abide seeking sustenance
I am sustained in the pursuit

I see inside beside beyond and around
I intentionally blur the lines

I admire brevity

I take pride in refinement
I relish a good mess

I believe in the word
I am the word

I am a thought
I am a multiple

I am prime

I do not run
I walk and walk and walk

I am disabled
I persevere

I laud a fierce storm
I have met her — twice

I know pain well acquainted
I navigate best by night

I find love
I loose love

I wonder always what is — love

I reread great books
I am invigorated by conversation

I wage war without weapons

I rally the troops with pragmatism

I usurp command
I relinquish myself

I am Master Sun
I am unknown moons

I am the tide
I am the aftermath

I am the blah
I am the ish

I am the owwwwwwww

2015

besieged, I eat steak

I fear
I cannot leave
my wine cigarette
or steak

it’s hard to leave
good bread on the table
or a beautiful woman in sight

laughter billows

memories from underground
she was french and
rode the subway

after work
after death
after-life she laughed

I undressed her across the table
using one eye to capture
the other to
possess

—still working on that
steak
sir?

2011

eating plums

you ring
like a
fire drill

text me
into a
tailspin

fury
kept
to myself

shoes off
in the pillows
oh you need to breathe

not til the beds
liquefied
between

a game of chess
in the nude

winner

keeps all
we are far
more truthful

eating plums

2014-2020

elixir of hope

old stone streets
japanese tea
intuition

steeped wood shades
metal latches
serenity

flamenco guitar
long hair
dim light

cathedrals
echoes
old souls

musings
lonely men
wicker chairs

trees
condensation
soggy ash

nostalgia
raw almonds
stirred imagination

pale sun
oxidation
without quarrel

southern gypsies
mango juice
tobacco

for the gods
prayer and
virtue smoked

faithful
unfaithful
inked in parlance

companions
keenly saturated
elixir of hope

2014-2020

flesh

despite time and punishment
I reside diffuse
within you

like a hunter-wanderer seeking
new land new prey: balance
diet of flesh and greens

attune to the ways of hunting
keen to a scent permeating
distant yet familiar

scent of the poet I abandoned
rove to that cruel place
to indulge antagonizing sensibilities we call experience

the monsoons came unrelenting
and all that happened I sought to pause as if pause were possible but
return revealed much unrecognizable

until autumns tender breeze
carried word
prescribing a solution

I am fortunate that geology is less fastidious
fortunate that flesh retains form
that bones alone fail to entreat

in flesh there is adhesion:
forces like those which bind rocks
they act upon and bind all that rattles within me

binding flesh once again around bone to make: flesh and bone
to make something of the idea the experience the labor the promise

it is no surprise that I made use of my chisels last week
to reveal the steel beneath the door
to strip the beige raw
to resuscitate

all that suffocates
all that yearns
all that is worth
protecting

2012

in the time of lilies

sugar laced
green hills

maple trees
in moonlight

seeping through
a blue breeze

the footbridge to
Hortus Botanicus

a silver boat
rowing

without oars
taking on

water
over-flowing

the perennial cusp
in bloom

once
submerged

slender nymphs
raise anchor

before
transforming

again
and again
and again

2009/2022

for max

thunder swims naked

the future swoons
off the bow
in an ode to weightless-ness

confessing
she’s never felt like that
before

now we’ve gone
gracefully
where we both feared to go

adrift

in solar winds
keen to the crest
of recurrent fractalline changes

for the better
the kinder
the softer

indeed
thunder swims naked

2012

for gonzo and maría

reina sophia

in the night
towards
dawn
when our room became
just
light enough to find our faces
tinted
blue
you see
up close
what light I
shield
tries to
illuminate
unlike
any
light

before
illuminated
a way
towards
you
breathe
warmly
reaching
your soft talons grasp around
my roots
my origins
drawn from the haze we
   are
so far
from the forest
so deep
in the woods

as
I
sigh
with

and
as I
sigh
without

2012

reina sofía

en la noche
hacia
el amanecer
cuando nuestra habitación se volvió
   apenas
suficiente iluminada para
encontrar nuestras caras
pintadas
azules
verás
allí
que luz yo
escudo
intenta
iluminar

como
nunca
antés
iluminó
un camino
hacia
a ti
respira
calentando
acercando
tus suaves talones sujetados alrededor
mis raíces
mis orígenes
emergiendo desde el humo aqui
estamos
tan lejos
del bosque
tan profundo
en el bosque

como
suspiro
con
y como
suspiro
sin

2013

Translated by David Firmin

nocturne for an elusive muse

there's an ethic
a cold philosophy

an intimate fight
a parallel pursuit

late dinners
digressions diversions

drafts on the vine
circling back though tracks

shrouded in spindrift
she whispers I’m here in dreams

but don't count
on her

signals and
senses

syndromes
she too suffers

ethics of a revolutionary
a cold philosophy

a recurrent theme
enduring silence

stubborn spirits
merciless swimmers

relentless conspirators
accomplices in flight

we all fly
in due time

2013/2022

rations

are
the days
too short?

or does time
moves at speeds
stealth beyond perception

passion
rationed in plastic
returned – like the poems I sent you

2009-2014

searchlight

if coordinates last known lead
to a cascade
less dense
than logic

and un-tied at the hip short-circuits
all that remains
un-said

then reasons un-known orbit
asymmetric
secrecies

I fear we’re caught
between true north and
an inconceivable declination

where inquiry perisists in the searchlight
of what must be done
with remnants

weightless yet
too heavy
to hold

2019

for anne

smoke inside

we lit up
in the back
behind the bar

clouds descend
the night
unbuttoned

whiskey
drugs
sex

I like
learning
the hard way

sparked again
as the sweat dried
we burned the sheets

it’s hard to hate you
when I come
so hard

siri says I should dump you
quit smoking
and get a job

I tried the patch
chewing gum
and hypnosis

you just keep
breaking
the spell

2014

which is why

your lower lip
tasted

chapped
with winter’s

perennial craving
warmth

from the first
fleeting

sip

thinking

I could be
the one

you kept
no secrets

from
this time

the bend:
around a decade

anew with or
with out

all I need
to know

I know
for now

warmth will come
in forms anew

elevated:
heart

racing
at the thought

of you
near

by
the way

did you fall
asleep

listening
to this?

2019

enduring silence part II

so we do
invent.
we have

invented.
a way.

to chart shores that don’t lead to each other
to allow wind and waves to slam our chests because

we need to be slammed
ever-so-often
to know just
how close we’ve come
to know
what’s most simple.
most binary
most connecting
us    to earth
if only to earth

even if it’s not the heel that touches
even if it’s not our legs that sense
the force
that pulls us down.

if we were suspended
in the sea
in an instant
we would not need feet
to feel
we would not need legs
to float
we would need only
   air.

the same air
for you and for me.

so why not leave behind the traces of necessity
leave behind all that was required
all they say is    required
and invent
new requirements.

I require   art
wind
writing
   fruit
yoga

and you.

tell me. what do you require ?

2012