Five Years Gone Page 4
the world shaded in grey, black, white,
my own memories washed clean of the blood,
puddles of turpentine drawing blanks in my head.
what’s left plays like a slide show
single frames without context, blurring
together and hard to determine. is that me
throwing the boy down on the pavement?
am I the one being thrown?
the ravenous packs of pre-teens roaming
through small town wilds, pecking their order
out on the keyboards of the administration
I’m trying to put together the descriptions
of acts forgotten, misremembered, mistaken
but still permanently recorded.
paperwork never lies, never forgets, can only
be misfiled and forgotten. let me forget.
there’s nothing to remember, nothing to watch
and film burns so well, red and gold instead
memories taking color at last.
Tarot
Don’t ask questions
you won’t hear the
answers to.
Am I who I think I am?
The Devil, reversed.
But a card can’t tell you
what to do about it.
Toss them behind you
one at a time,
walking,
and they will tell you
where you are going.
Ace
Around the world
Where the king sits low
If the cards run to favor
Fickle Jack,
You lie so low
Even your Suicide King
Climbs over your body
In hope of getting somewhere
Will you define
What you divine
In the lays of the queens
And their masters?
Became
Crimson scales and
bloody claws digging
into his head.
The world is your
film set and the customers,
your players and Francis,
poor Francis is your understudy
and your manager, your metaphoric prima-donna.
Bathe in red spotlight,
rip down the scenery.
Nothing is enough. Is it
the boy’s Becoming you worry about
or your own, lowering you
to a humanity you despise?
Defibrillation
your skin sharp
sparking blue and green
lightning in your
eyes, hands
skies
a glance
minor strike
my limbs not working
clear
a heartbeat
restored, magnetic
pressing against you
electricity renewed
contact with you
phones, wires
fingertips
all conducting that
symphonic, subatomic
the charge fading
touch me again
wind me up
before you send me
on my way
Fur
my bones are broken
dozens of times, healed
at inhuman angles
I put my fur coat away
for the summer, for your sun
fighting against
star-spangled snow
and frozen moonlight
unmoving, unhealing
an adolescent totem
carved in wood
kept among the marble
without knowing why
and burning still
Five Years Ago
All the old things burn.
They whisper curses and wiring,
children with matches,
isn’t it a shame
it’s reduced to ash-scarred
bricks. From the latest scene
smoke still rises, a canary
sings behind scorched windows.
Across the street I watch
them whisper
it’s the times,
the terrorists, the communists.
I smile very thin
and I strike my match.
Lucia
you wore red
and I knew you hated me
even as I saw you
a curve of hips,
flash of pale skin
beneath the corset’s straps
you walked to your own funeral
laughed like ice
and held your knife
like you’d held me
you wore white
and the stains are all my fault
smoke and copper
ozone and regret
your legs bare and still pale
eyes so open
and I could only
love you more