as soon as we're in the throat of the worst

as so

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the t

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t of

the w

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008.

otis pig.

CREATIVE COMMONS NONCOMMERCIAL LICENSE, 2008.these poems may be reproduced or modified for noncommercial use with credit to the author.

published by for sleepwalkers.

MANUFACTURED IN OLYMPIA, WASHINGTON BY FOR SLEEPWALKERS

for sleepwalkers books all bound by hand. www.forsleepwalkers.com.

art & design by otis pig.

second edition.

for what happens next.

prologue. the noises of unstoppable beings.7. (about how it all happened, who is who, what is what).

i. one of the two reasons to look outside your window.11. as soon as we’re in.12. for thebe, callisto, leda & friends. 14. seven wonders, seven awnings, seven children, years of war. 16. thank you robin language. thank you contradiction, water. 18. an open mouth of horns, a distance. 19. have we been out of the wilderness that long?22. on lucidity, infinity, blood & dripping fallacy. 23. the anti-matter sub space universe & (some anecdotes, explanations).25. we know where the exit music goes.

ii. at dawn & breathing souls toward a world that moves, i-xiv. 31. i. dear teenager, mouth. 32. ii. dear anyone who gives a shit, mccauley.33. iii. dear señioritas, rose.34. iv. dear trees, red beast. 35. v. dear mother, boy gabe.36. vi. dear priest, mother. 37. vii. dear west, train.38. viii. dear brother on the coast, sebastian.39. ix. dear david, kathleen.40. x. dear human race, the towers in the distance. 41. xi. dear ozzie osbourne, aeroplane.42. xii. dear mccauley, old jane.43. xiii. dear christ, arthur.44. xiv. dear balloons, birthday girl.

iii. fear is just a dance for folks who don’t have feet.49. as soon as we’re in the throat.50. dying of thirst like wires of blood crossing sand.52. fire one more silver bullet we can open up the universe.54. in the stomach of the magician. in the universe blood. 56. a million hours tall. a million miles young. 57. meeting the open heart wastebasket.60. so many sub par puncture wounds (not so many law abiding daughters).62. it takes me all night to wake up. it takes me all day to get to sleep.64. the silent films we made in foreign languages. 66. what makes us safe what makes us human.

table of contents.

iv. in the corridors of welcome & the corridors of wet.71. when the beast follows the hundred children, who follows the beast?72. the most human that you’ll ever be is monkey. 75. sometimes i feel as sad as a broken blues rec–sometimes i feel as sad as a broken blues rec–sometimes i feel as sad as a broken blues record.77. two fifty me & hamms. lookin’ four a place two fit in.

in nar dscans panoceans, i-ii.79. i. with pirates brandishing silence.80. ii. the space between our mouths & mind.

v. two lefts, a bridge crossing, then straight through ‘til morning. 87. as soon as we’re in the throat of the worst. 88. mouthing quiet threats to no avail while drowning in the simulation sea.92. i would give my sister to watch a whale devour my sister. i would give a whale to watch my sister devour a whale. 94. ...in which our everyman finds his place, cowers to the human condition.96. amalgamations & blindness. wombs, deathbeds, immobility & lovelies. romance, mothers. 98. we can’t tell our children that we’re good (we’re faint. we’re mice. we’re losing.).100. the discovery of truth as eerie mountain. the discovery of truth as ambiguity. 102. dead, our dead, our dead end streets. 103. on tightrope walking, sleepwalking.

vi. what is not okay in dreams, i-v.107. i. (about who is watching & what is possible).109. ii. (about how time’s passing makes twisted longings seem invisible).111. iii. (about the ugliness of violence & irrational motives).113. iv. (about the burden of brotherhood & love with sore necks). 115. v. (about the years i spent falling from my window in the haze of urban twilight & the way children brush off impact when they believe).

vii. a million hours tall & the serpent as a walking stick. 123. this metaphor is breaking up.126. while the world is still immobile. 128. how i learned to be half of the perfect pair.130. listen & the human condition (tells us a piece of her name).135. twilight as a world of final actions which are waiting for the night.136. we don’t have to live in the dark anymore. 139. as soon as we’re in the throat of the worst just keep breathing.

epilogue. the bodies of unstoppable beings.141. (about the places we can go now that we don’t have to live in the dark).

the noises of unstoppable beings are what kept me from running, as funny as that sounds. i needed to see it to believe it.

i believe it.

these poems were written in the winter of an evergreen. not much was happening as far as outstretched hands are concerned. i didn’t go many places, meet many people, or do many things.

these poems were written all at once. i blinked & found this book in my lap, with my blood & mind all over it. where does all the time go?

where does all the time go?

i learned a lot, but also didn’t learn much. i didn’t discover what the throat of the worst is, but i found out where it lives.

anyway...

unstoppable beings are closing in fast. as the name entails, this cannot be prevented. they don’t know the difference between one human heart & a million hours of bone.

don’t turn & run––the world is round. the more you flee, the closer you are to the source. never shut your eyes for long. its dangerous.

their noises are lumbering from just beyond the distance. hisses, horns & other deafening sounds. any minute now their bodies will be on top of you. any minute now, your body will be in their mouths.

don’t turn & run. you can’t escape, so just stay where you are. redwoods are the bravest beings––sink your socks into the soil & wait.

look it in the face just to see.

prologue. the noises of unstoppable beings.

one of the two reasons

to

look outside

your

window

.

i .

i. 11one of the two reasons to look outside your window

from our pupils to the telescope lens,to outer space,

there’s an unwavering line. there’s an unwavering

sense

of universal concern

that breathes the hum & radiationof voices,

beginnings,

endings,

asp

writhes in the farthest corners.

as soon as we’re in.

12 otis pig as soon as we’re in the throat of the worst.

sleep is sharing stories with the moon. the moon is lonely, spun in outer space with outstretched hands. outstretched hands are spanning oceans,

which are oceans full of water. which is water full of oxygen. oxygen is full of life & life

is full of sleepy moons.

g

sleepy moons,sleepy moons,

wake up, make life happen. no one told you what to do.

there are so many things i forgot. if our memories never bent we could build a bridge to jupiter.

we could shake hands, make friends:

“jupiter loves you.” “i love you, jupiter.”

nobody told us what to do, so let’s keep nodding our heads. with every repetition

for thebe, callisto, leda & friends.


another world goes by.

there are sixty-three moons around jupiter & all they do is hold their breath.

everything falls into place,

nothing needs to happen again.

sleepy moons,sleepy moons,

break the law, or run away from home.

asteroids live a lonely life, but they see

both sides of the universe.

g

the best thing for a brother is a sister. the best thing for a sister is a sun.

the best thing for a son is

sleep. brother, sister,

mother, moon, wake up. wake me up.

take my hand, make me ready for life. i’m alive & ready& waiting

for life.


seven children died to the awe of morning.

while seven awnings separate the rain,other children mourn through dragonfly film that covers

poetic disasters.

g

sounds that sound the same are artificial.

poetasters dream about return to form & slavery;nothing returns,

just happens again.

g

the seven things you’ve got to know are just the seven wonders.

know ancient spells. know the reasons there are reasons children mourn.

know enormous meteors, the burning throats, know adam & eve.

what’s left inside the garden is what we need to make us whole.

seven wonders, seven awnings, seven children, years of war.


g

when the truth is thrust as weight, the weight of being human all at once, try to imagine

legs bending backward—

we’ve got a long, long way to go.

we’ve got a mountain mouthing secrets, if we couldunderstand the language.

we’ve got a lifeless morning state declaring war. are seven years of war enough?


i don’t need any twentieth century romance coughing blood

on my shoes or the grand design,

the last thing this world needs is another revolution.

i gave birth to my mother,hurriedly.

now she’s got no weapons, language, instinct,

wisdom to fight, to hold over me.

the last thing this world needsis more need.

‘ there’s a panic.

don’t worry about the panic. that is someone else’s panic.

panics are contagious, so look the other way. look:

a robin’s being blessed. a robin’s reading requiem. a robin’s rubbing the holy throat,

thank you robin language. thank you contradiction, water.


we need more robins. we need more need.

the last thing this world needs is another contradiction.

the first thing this world needs is water, location, or some kind of twitching

in some kind ofsoup.

or an amoeba with incentive

to crawl from the ocean & mutate

into skyscrapers

built for toppling.


deaf mute davis is breaking the law byspeaking, bylistening.

welcome to the corollary hallway.

madame someone isspindling a novel

from her magnificent mouth, her treasury of history.

this novel says everything, faintly

about everything, really.

the whole story.

mayor june is squinting cold dawn eyes:

what a tremor for the morning.what an open mouth mountain.

what an open mouth of horns that is sounding in the distance.

deaf mute davis, there are only two real reasons to look beyond your window.

there are only two real reasons to hear or say a thing.

an open mouth of horns, a distance.


later, in the stratosphere, i’ll be gaping for breath

& drilling reliefvalves into the useless parts of my brain,

which is how i end up dying.

& it’s the end of what could be a very engaging dinner conversation, like: “how’d he get up to the stratosphere?“ why am i carrying a drill?”

the brain has no sensation of pain—not with needles, notwith words.

why would the brain tell the brain that the brain is injured?

if i had a map of my mind i could pierce it,

whyis the majority so useless?

at the dinner conversation i am saying,

“in the future, when we’re all dead, the children will be piercing their brains.they’ll be

have we been out of the wilderness that long?


tattooing their bodies&selling their soulsthey’ll abandon all their ugly, pregnant babies. they’ll be

selling their bodies &abandoning their soulsthey’ll tattoo their malformed & toxic babies. they’ll be

abandoning their bodies&tattooing their soulsthey’ll sell all their used, refurbished babies.

when we’re all dead the world will be as godless as our parents warned usthanks to rock & roll & california

&california will be eaten by los angeles, which will be eaten by the ocean, which will be eaten by a giant mouth, which will be eaten up by reason.

the brain can still imagine pain.so,

i troubled myself to imaginethat pain is controlled by the only part of our bodies that can’t feel it.

i troubled myself to shake hands with our universe, whom i meton my trip up to the stratosphere.

our universe can still feel pain, has a loose grip


&is home to some of the biggest mouths,could eat up reason.

later, after the dinner party, i’m losing my way home (like, i’m losing direction as a concept, not just my sense of it) & i’m thinking, what’s so bad about the wilderness? if i had ever lived in the wilderness, maybe i’d have instincts.

like, if i were a dog i’d smell traces of my leaked imagination on the sidewalk. that would be my ticket home.

(the leaked imagination is what seeps out through the relief valves in my mind. they’re what cause the pressure, they’re what cause the stratosphere.)

so what if california’s eaten, will be eaten, is in the center of the matryoshka doll of eaten? so what if the kids are piercing their brains with something other than bullets? i’ll never make it home with all this losing my direction.

where are we in the story? is time really such a trick? i know my own death, but i don’t know if it’s happened yet. why am i carrying a drill?

am i dead or am i just walking? have we been out of the wilder-ness that long?”

thank goodness for my instincts, i found homeor

i found a new definition for home,means

i found a new home.


it’s okay to be the boss, if you’ve got the lucidity.it’s okay to decide

who dies, who did it,&what what means.

or to paint kiss portraits out of unicorn blood,or to spread disease like wings.

it’s okayto shoot endangered birds, to be endangered, you

are being shot by other infidels.

it’s okay to sing other people’s songs & say that you belong inside the song, inside the other people’s voices

when you don’t.

anything is possible when it isn’t. you can go anywhere you want when you are stuck.

don’t believe anyone when they tell you that they love you,because they do.

don’t believe anyone when they say they’ll save you from this spellbecause they will.

on lucidity, infinity, blood & dripping fallacy.


i remember my dad, beating me every nightat boggle.

what wonderful vocabularies; there were grasshoppers in my pocket.

with all that hopeless excitement,it must have been a rough night for the grasshoppers.

what’s the youngest you can be for a postmodern crisis?

back in the day a three-year-old boy could get his head run over, & suffer only one concussion.

he never had a bloody nose & stillgot his homework done. back in the day leukemia was a typewriter.

i remember the night my mother went to jail& did not pass go.

she made some kind of jumpinto an anti-matter sub space universe.

not in the name of necessity, but convenience.

believe what you believe, the only thing worse than monopoly is science &

the anti-matter sub space universe (& some anecdotes, explanations).


the only thing worse than science

is fiction. the only thing worse than fiction is philosophy, & what is worse than asking, “why are philosophy & poetry so braided?”

only other poets read poetry & all poets have been exiledto academia.

neither pupil nor instructor have ideas anymore,

instead they translate lectures into verse . they do it for credit,i got

credit

(if there isn’t a god at least there’s credit).

philosophers don’t believe in anything. poets believe in everything,

what is the difference?

i risked my life to take my brother’s life

in risk.

i risked my life to take my sister’s life

in life.


we’ve got rapping winds, callous raindrops & a howl that’s more than just sound.

my life is on the balcony, observing this cacophony with you:

a distance of transformers are erupting, which turns horizons blue as bombs.

the sky has got electric blues, & the trees have never bawled this loud before.

still,my life is on the balcony, dreaming in funereal sounds.

i’m loving the dread & i am dreading this beauty. that is how i survive. somewhere someone’s life is climaxing. mine is wishing we belonged

inside the eyeof this windstorm.

why can’t the whole world just agree that this is a novel we are living in —we know where the exit music goes.

we know where the exit music goes.


my life is on a balcony but it would be dancing through the dodgy streets if i were brave. W look:

there is a search party of one:a flashlight &a rainy pair of glasseswalking house to house for two lost sisters. they were taking photos

of the rain.

W automobiles who just won’t quit are moving W through the streets. W automobiles who just won’t quit for anything.

my life is on the balcony, my life is on the roof. my life is in the spinning sky,

“how will i die?”“where & when

will i die?”

my life turns, my little turns, they turn to you.

“why can’t the whole world just agree on this one thing?” “why can’t the whole world just agree?”

at dawn & breathing souls

toward

a

world that

moves,

i-xiv

.

i i .

ii. 31at dawn & breathing souls towards a world that moves

by the time this letter’s found you’re sure to notice that i’ve left the side of your bed.

it’s been two months since you lost your lips in the desert. two months from now you’ll lose your teenage magnetism, too.

these past few weeks i’ve been burning little bits of love by looking out the window. last night i got lost when someone left it open for breeze:

i seeped from myself; i floated all the miles back to our secret alleyway. the concrete had forgotten my name; it was someone else’s setting now.

leaving is easier for me because i’ve still got legs to walk with. this is trouble for the both of us, believe me, but i’m off to san francisco.

i’ll give you my address, but i won’t read your letters. i’ll write you letters but they won’t tell you a thing.

regarding ephemeral stages,

i.

dear teenager,


mouth.

i’ve given up on glasses because i’ve been losing a pair a week. i know my way around the house, my way around this life.

who needs sight when you’ve lived as long as i?

i’m only missing details. nothing but trouble ever came from details. details are just insects on the wall.

why wait for changes in the sea, or in the weather? who cares what direction, there’s always some wind blowing.

age is an excuse to make stories from what’s missing. i’m missing my glasses; i can’t read a thing.

all i’ve got left is the stories that exist inside me. i still don’t know for keeps: will it ever be enough?

thanks a lot everybody for never writing back,mccauley.

ii.

dear anyone who gives a shit,


now i know what it means to be danced out. million’s just a num-ber ‘till you see it—how could i ever pick that many flowers?

how could i ever make that many friends, make that many friends feel good?

the gardens here are covered in cement. the language here is diz-zying, the sounds don’t ever sleep, i haven’t slept all week.

nobody breathes, no one ever holds their breath.

i guess i’m at the bottom of a hungry beast & maybe no heart’s big enough to save a place like this. this is not the new york city life i wanted.

craning my neck with all this upward trouble,rose.

iii.

dear señoritas,


since rose has been gone i can finally be gone, too. if i stick around in this alley town too long i might become a ghost.

is there a way to be immune to the stingers that stand after hid-eous looks cower? is there a way to turn invisible?

is there a road that ever leads to the place that i belong?

i could take my flower with me, & all the passersby would jump in wonder: how enchanted is a gardenia suspended? how en-chanting does it glide across the street?

little do they know it’s all a part of a wandering beast that no one sees.

but what if i find her, & i can’t turn back?

that would be perfect.

don’t write,red beast.

iv.

dear trees,


i can’t count all the colors i can see with my fingers because both my hands have gone missing.

it’s always so loud here, but it’s just the right kind of loud.

sorry i missed your birthday card. i would’ve written, “thank you for being my mom, mom.”

everything’s okay. my elbow didn’t get bruised where i got hit. i’m really lucky for that.

there’s so many stories here that i never have to go to sleep. just bedtime story after bedtime story after bedtime story.

don’t worry i got baptized on the way up.

watching over you, boy gabe.

v.

dear mother,


i’m writing you to cancel boy gabe’s baptism. something came up. something big came up.

i imagine that you’ve read the papers.

i’ve been dreaming, since it happened. i’ve been dreaming but i haven’t slept; i’ve been living like a ghost, sleepwalking nowhere. while the rest of the world is still happening i watch unreal-ity seep through the cracks in my ceiling. the two are switching places—every voice & turn just seems impossible.

i imagine that, if i ever fall asleep again, everything i’ve forgotten about would be waiting for me just the way i left it.

i hope this doesn’t put me in the wrong line, but nothing (i mean nothing) can fix this.

with dangerous insomnia,mother.

vi.

dear priest,


you broke my mechanical heart.

when i discovered that you end on the california coast it made me blow my horn for hours.

like a dirge, like a mournful page trumpet.

i wanted to believe that some things never stop; i thought that west could be forever.

still, i can’t deny you died with grace—with the way that ocean glows at dawn, i’ll keep believing:

if it wasn’t for the seven cars of passengers behind me i would have dived into the depths of your dying just to be a part of you.

lost (but still on rails),train.

vii.

dear west,


you won’t believe that i jumped but i jumped, off our rooftop. no i never flew, but something even better happened.

there was a moment when i was still in the air—still, not continu-ing to be, but more like without motion—between the rise & fall where i was something more than suspended.

no one gave me to the evening, i belonged.

if i could live my whole life as one moment it’d be that one. i was nowhere, which means i could have been anywhere.

please forgive the penmanship. i’m writing with my mouth be-cause my arms have both been broken.

if you want, just for laughs, tell dad he’s the reason that i jumped. let him know he ruined everything that’s good for me, just for laughs.

laughing, broken, waiting for more than more than suspension,sebastian.

viii.

dear brother on the coast,


i know you hate letters & i would write you a poem only my fingers are too weak to pen those heavy words.

if i wrote you a poem i’d probably have to make it perfect & you know that perfect words are the heaviest.

you know that nothing’s really perfect, especially my reason, but i have reason to believe that if you were real you wouldn’t like me.

& if i put you in a poem you’d be real.

with all appeals for clemency,kathleen.

ix.

dear david,


we’re not worried we’ll be wounded, just forgotten.

on the morning of the crash it started:

we’re sinking inches every day. no one dares admit to it but we’re growths upon a shrinking surface. we’re dinosaurs waiting to be fossils.

strip us of purpose so we mean something. strip us of meaning so we can matter.

the world is on it’s way to different needs & if people stop look-ing up our tops might disappear.

toward a function which serves the fascination,towers in the distance.

x.

dear human race,


regarding the time you went inside me, some things were left behind:

one pair of glasses, headphones, & the weight of fame in famine.

i’m sure it must be yours; the entity is stained with bad ideas, theatrical blood & thirty years of juvenile bellows.

i’m sure it must be yours. i don’t even have a name.

i hope you’re feeling light these days, i hope your spine is finally straight. but please-o-please, i beg you, take it back.

i didn’t earn this weight. i sleep in bunkers without curtains. I only belong in the sky

this weight is such a burden that i can’t lift off the ground.

bloated, stuck in portland thanks to you,aeroplane.

xi.

dear ozzie osbourne,


i got your letter yesterday, i’m sorry that you’re losing your sight. everything’s fine at my end; i have parkinson’s disease.

what i don’t have is my children; they’ve grown. alex is on drugs, & susan’s in a student sunset. pete doesn’t listen to anyone’s voice, he lives downtown in atlanta.

what fascinates me is the three different lives we live. our lives as children, mothers, & our lives as human waste. we are wisdom in a box. we’re too slow for a world where tomorrow and the past all happen at the same time.

i swoon & i blush each time my children cry because that’s when i am needed. my children haven’t cried for years.

i will always write back; we need empathy for the discarded. is your home as cold as my home? in other countries, other centu-ries no one lives past forty. now i understand.

i will always write back,

old jane.

xii.

dear mccauley,


at the opening no one bought my artwork. it’s like i’m living in the past, or in a mirror dimension that you have to make a mis-take to fall into.

if i’d been selling trepidation, shaking heads, or a world where everything dies just do die, then maybe i’d be paying rent this month.

they treat you like a novelty—what do they fill that empty space with, the space where their soul belongs?

i’m a mountain being dug into. i’m vincent price in a world of zombies. this wallflower world makes me feel like a naked savage, mouths of teeth for years of safety. i want out.

the world’s converging inward; i can only hope that seeing our whole condition paralyzed is enough to maybe summon you.

i told them “wait & see,” but i’m the only one who’s waiting. arthur.

xiii.

dear christ,


i can’t remember your names, i can’t remember your colors.

i heard about a boy who died. keep him company.

i don’t know what belongs with what, but i know i’ll be alright. we had a good party; thank you all for coming. next year i’ll be nine.

there’s a dream i had last night, and all of you were in it. every-thing was fine, but not quite perfect.

i loved watching you disappear. i loved the way you rose as sil-houettes. that’s what i would like to be.

love,birthday girl.

xiv.

dear balloons,

fear is just a dance for

folks

who

don’t have

feet

.

i i i .

iii. 49fear is just a dance for folks who don’t have feet.

thanks to falling satellites, i’ll never mistake

poetry for stars again.

the satellites are homesick, lining up outside the stratosphere with walls of ugly truth.with

songs of doomsday orbiting their twisted apparitiongears.

they’ve got ether, we’ve got wonder.

we’ve got structure.they’ve got weight.

we’ve got wishes, we’ve got words.they’ve got impact.

as soon as we’re in the throat.


this is the last thing i said: “are you walking away or just shrinking?”

it turns out you were doing both.

here’s what i remember best from independence day:anxiety is closing the doors. i’ll watch the fireworks

through my window.

we’re back at the war, & nothing looks more dying of thirstthan wires of blood crossing sand.

we’re back at the ocean. who’d believe the world could actually end? listen to the sound:

it’s our country tying nooses out of endings.

i’d rather die from growths & the craters of my body, here,

pride pollutes a good man after too long in the desert bowels.

at the dining hall it’s oatmeal, pills & jesus.sunday means it’s french toast, pills & god.

i didn’t mean to lose the better half of me. i didn’t mean to lose my lower half.

dying of thirst like wires of blood crossing sand.


so much for falling asteroids. every direction is upin outer space.

the air i’m breathing out is colder than the oxygen that’s coming in.

but where would i be stuck if you were living?

somewhere there’s a story, sorry, but my life looks like a heartbeat on the page.

i know that you’re in outer space, & so i think of you:bedridden means i’m always looking up.


thank you for the silver bullets,

they opened me up. i learned so much about myself

while myself was spilling out of me.

what sickness of the mind could ever lead us to believewe are the only ones?

what consciousness crush disease could fester the delusion,we are anything

unique?

we speak in different languages, but

languages all come from the same place,all come from the same need to move our mouths.

we share such lovely momentsfrom the factory.

we could compare, but why compareexact equality?

when our simulacra’s glowing the way moon is glowing it warms me up to know that there’s

fire one more silver bullet we can open up the universe.


another one.another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one.another one. another one. another one. another one. another one.

we can build a ladder out of copies, ‘til not even the earth can bring us back to earth.

we can fire one more silver bullet, we can

open up the universe. we’ve got to find out what’s behind it so ‘ ÔÔto find out what’s inside of us.


home is the softest mass to ever crush a mobile body. love is the heaviest.

love is a nebulous mass.

imagine all the ponderous boulders that your brain & heart had pushed while you were sleeping.

there are places you are stuck to. there are places you don’t mind being stuck to, but

what a nebulous welcomeawaits you in the morning when you run away:

soon you’ll be sleeping on a sleepless train to chicago

& waking with a novel set of wings. soon you’ll be faking all hypnosis

tothe cooing of machinery.to the turning of the moments, time

has never seemed negotiable.

so trifling, invincible, time

in the stomach of the magician, in the universe blood.


has never seemed so bored. we know the world is never bored, only exhausted.

what we’ve got is such an awestruck, bedridden world.

tonight we’re sleeping in the stomach of the magician. tonight we’re hungry just for fun,

sinking fangs into the universe.

tonight we’re learning to forget about tomorrow’sblood river underbelly.

where does the human adventure sleep after it’s over? we’ve be-come the station by never being still,

by looking under the wrong rocks (is the world just a rock? is the world just an image?) & by thanking the wrong accidents.

wherever you go, you’re still in the same place. you’re still looking

out the same window, flashing like a rerun television.

is there a mass that isn’t empty? is there a nebula that’s safeto sleep in?

is there ever destination after resolution?

a poem always finds its way back home & so will you.

i hope you don’t mind being stuck.


i lost my love at the port of olympia,two hundred lost looks left me dry& huffing.

i didn’t mean to cry, i lost my countenance to tear gas.

with so much desperation, chants can turn to running curses. thanks to all your chemicals

there’s saliva in my language.

we know language will not save us. but it’s a good thing to listen to on restless, southern evenings

resonating languidly

from the corridors of welcome, & the corridors of wet. what does it mean to be alive?

wake up they’re still shooting rubber bullets deeper & deeper

into the wound.

we’ve got beasts the shape of sound & they are breathing down our necks.

our necks are a million hours tall, a million miles young.

a million hours tall. a million miles young.


alison bee toklas is on a train from new mexico ‘ to mexico.

the heat has got her seeping, she is trying out sleeping with one eye out the window,

she’s been waiting for a revelation.alison,you are the revelation.

g

morris safran sr. is hiking up the mountain for serenity. if anything at all ‘ he needs serenity.

he’s got a walking stick & two blankets for a rough night, but a mountain’s not the place for easy peace, morris learns after the windstorm.

g

morris safran jr.’s caught in the crestof the fall.

no one’s life is passing’at enormous speeds , before his eyes,

meeting the open heart wastebasket.


just a palate of perfect, seamless white. never before had jr.‘ envied any kind of imprint so dramatically.

g

jonathan jonathan is breaking some small rule, if only for the sound.

he doesn’t have a warrant for arrest, since the rules that he breaks are so subtle. he

loves the noises of shattered ‘ institutions ‘ like a tempestuous ocean of bone.

g

oothout zabriskie whitehead is dreading his eternity. when the time comes to put his pentoward holy paper

will he sign the weight of all his earthly beings?

the make-believes? the lives he gave his body to?

g

kate ms. lovely evenings drilled pinprick holes in her ceiling,

&


boarded up her windows extra thick. she even wants her days to become most starry nights. she wants to command the shapes of every constellation.

g

julia lewis has turned too many headswith the moves of her antics, with the antics of her moves. ‘ ‘ ‘ her antics

came from the city, but she used them in the town. there is a lawsuit filed against her moves, & the damage doneto tetchy, bending necks.

g

mora pierce rendall has got a legacy that’s glowing from my heart&

from my mind. she is an illusionary comfort, an’imaginary muse.

i wish there was a way i could’ve met her,i wish

i hadn’t killed her.


the best sheath for your knife is my left kidney, a kidney’s sucha soft, warm place to hide.

i could use a better puncture wound, i’ve got so many sub par puncture wounds.

i’ve got so many nosebleeds.if i could sell my nosebleeds

my thirsty wallet could finally choke. but blood belongs in the ground.

either it’s dry sinuses or cancer,either i need saline spray or chemo.

blessed means we’re swimming in milky mother’s loveblessed means we’ll never drown,

what are oceans for?

every single one of us has got to have a mother.don’t hide it, hold her close.

it’s the law.

wood is the life of the fire, butfire

so many sub par puncture wounds (not so many law abiding daughters).


is the death of our wood. what is your fire? what is your wood?

let’s hide the liquor in our livers, let’s hide our livers in the trees.

let’s hide the trees inside the rain &let’s hide the rain inside our sleeves. our sleeves inside our coats. our coats inside of winter. let’s hide winter in the womb.

you’ve got to have a mother, got to have a mother, you’ve got to have a mother,it’s the law.


what parts of america have you been to?

what parts of your body have you peeked in on?

pack your bags & head out the door while your body parts are still working,

while there’s still some america left.

turning thirteen is the ugliest thing you could do, what an ugly fate to look at,

that you’re turning thirteen twice.

‘ so, ‘‘‘‘ finish growing up we’re in a different place. you can open up your eyes we’re in a different place.

because fear is just a dance for folks who don’t have feet. keep your toes pointed inward,

like you’re walking on a wire.keep your’feet’on’the ground,

because you’re luckier than diamonds

to have feet.to have ground.

it takes me all night to wake up. it takes me all day to get to sleep.


as long as you keep dancing you’re the axis of the universe.as long as you keep from smiling you’re the most beautifully

misled.

in the instant when your doubt’s in turn, ‘ all our turning stops.

you’re the pigment of my skin, you’re my skin, you’re not my skin.

it takes me all night to wake up. it takes me all day to get to sleep.

you’re the wall between my kitchen & my bathroom. ‘ you’re my wall, my kitchen & my bathroom.

i haven’t seen a whole lot of america. ‘ i live in a very small space.


do you know unlikely places? i could

fall in love with all of them, only it’s such a chore to recognize

of magnificence, when looking at the eyesof magnificence.

of magnificence of is the soundtrack to your whims.

of every whim

deserves its own beat, with the rhythms of our heart beats. our hearts beat on each

whim. every whim is a universe of microscopic singing.

we could travel to unlikely places & have moments stored as memories.

we could use them in the silent films we make in foreign languages

only,

the silent films we make in foreign languages.


it’s not likely we will find the maps thattake us to unlikely places.

you know a poem can be anything:

brushes of eyelashes or brush strokesusing paint.

poems can be troubles with toothbrushes, or the trails that follow bombs.

a poem is the action more than meaning, since the action is the meaning.

a poem is a never ever documented, real life

whim.

i’ve found myself in an unlikely’place; now i cannot move.

i’ve found myself aware & i am gawking at magnificence.

if i move i’m swept i’m swallowed.

if i move i’m washed away,

i’m somewhere else


i had no reason to open the door so i opened the door. no ghosts were there,

&no one was a person—i coughed invisible molecules,

but there wasn’t any voice to shout at me.

no unreal travelers, no sky president, no memories.

i needed more rest than i had had,

so have a peach & come inside my house. i’m sure you’ll say, ‘ ‘ “no thank you,”i’m sure you’ll keep not being there,as expected.

i don’t expect a lot out of life, just that i’ll keep breathing inthe oxygen around me.

so

as long as my diaphragm holds rhythm i’ll keep doing the things that i do:

what makes us safe what makes us human.


opening doors breathing in the oxygen & growing’peaches’to’rot in heavy life still,

in my home, on planet earth,

at least we have oxygen to breathe. at least we were placed with thought of safety.

all good things happen on purpose. at least we can see the stars at night. at least we can see. at least we have stars. at least we have night.

in the corridors of

welcome

&

the corridors of

wet

.

i v.

iv. 71in the corridors of welcome & the corridors of wet.

wh

enthebea

st foll

ows

the hun

dredch ild

ren, wh

o follows

th

e bea st?

when the beast follows the hundred children, who follows the beast?


the only thing i’m sure of is: the sound of movement is move-ment.

the sound of what’s not happening is happening.

the sound

of sound

is sound.

the only thing i’m not sure of is: what is what’s not happening?

the game is ladder,

everything is on the ladder (the ladder is the devil’s tipping).

everything is a place where it’s okay

to just be perfect without causing any paradox dilemmas

to be a jerk when you need to be a jerk.to be a mother when you need to be a mother.

everything is somewhere. everywhere

i go i’m somewhere else, somewhere i am everything.on

the most human that you’ll ever be is monkey.

otis pig 73in the corridors of welcome & the corridors of wet.

the ladder math is sound. the sound of ladder is fall. the sound of game is no, you know

the game of sound is human. the sound of human is monkey.&the sound of love as lines is:

the only thing i’m sure of is: the sound of movement is movement.

the sound of what’s not happening is happening. the sound of sound

is sound.

the only thing i’m not sure of is: what is what’s not happening?

the game is ladder,

everything is on the ladder (the ladder is the devil’s tipping).

everything is a place where it’s okay

to just be perfect without causing any paradox dilemmas

to be a jerk when you need to be a jerk. to be a mother when you need to be a mother.


everything is somewhere. everywhere

i go i’m somewhere else, somewhere i am everything. on

the ladder math is sound & the

sound of ladder is fall. the sound of game is no, you know.

the game of sound is human. the sound of human is monkey. & the sound of lines as love is:

“what is the trick?” “what is not the trick?”

“what is the magic?” “what is not the magic?”

“what is the magician?” “what is not the magician?”

the sound of being is seeing. the sound of yes is yes

is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes is yes.


the definition of animal is “cat.”

the center of center is “nt.”

the center of center of center is “of.”

i’d give you my gold tooth if you give me something real.a human experience,

like kisses on a stairwell, or a trip to the grand canyon wearing sandals.

sometimes i feel like i don’t have feelings.

purple is the color red is when red is feeling blue. never fear the gold; simulation’s just the sameas fanged imagination.

teeth are just bones. bones are just bones. bones are just teeththat bite at bodies without structure.

there’s nothing worse than believing that there’s nothing worse than believing.

sometimes i feel as sad as a broken blues rec–sometimes i feel as sad as a broken blues rec–sometimes i feel as sad as a broken blues record.


the center of center of center of center is “nt.”

i’d give you my gold tooth for a singular & central purpose,for a definition.

i’ll tell you the definition of future, “later.”

the grand canyon’s just another big container for a lot of empty space.

sometimes i feel like the grand canyon has feelings.sometimes i feel like the grand canyon.


just looking for a change of style in life. life was made for shame.

don’t ask me what that means, causestill life.

things i miss i can’t remember. things i like i don’t know yet.things i want i’m scared.

where i stand, well its just fine, so want to look for a place together?

or do you have a place? or are you just

reminiscing?

i’ve got a heart, it’s one percent hundred real, also:

as long as it

is in us

it is in.

things i can’t remember. things that i don’t know yet.

two fifty me & hamms. lookin’ four a place two fit in.


i don’t care where we live,

i don’t care where we belong,

do you want to look for a place? do you ever want to reminisce

i’ve got a heart & it’s one hundred percent real,but

life was made forshame.


i’m just a bored explorer—i’ve only been to nowhere, & i never found a thing.

i was never not a personi was never not a not person.

i never lost composure, but i did lose some bloodwhen somewhere

in the nowhere i was cut.

who cut me down? i’ve been marooned, strung loosewith innards spanning oceans.

who’d believe that anything could ever span an ocean?

with pirates brandishing silence,& teeth baring lullabies,

any island’s just the sameas the bottom of the sea.

in nar dscans panoceans.

i.

with pirates brandishing silence.


when i was cut i lost my voice & my direction,

my imagination & understanding1,

my severity & consequence,

my loss & certainty.

for mountains, months & evenings

all of it came pouring from my

stomach & my pores,

& fingers, my eyelids,

my nose, & thoughts,

& asshole my mouth,

into the ocean2.

all i’ve got left are my beliefs—

their names, their definitions, with all the impact gouged away. 3

1you couldn’t imagine how hard it was to lose my understanding. you’d never understand how much i long to find my imagination. 2who remembers names? an ocean is an ocean. nothing’s not an ocean. hello, ocean. nice to meet you, ocean. 3i put my scar in a shadowbox. i floss with my stitches. i love telling stories.

in nar dscans panoceans

ii.

the space between our mouths & mind.


so here are my beliefs without their innards:4

so onaworldwillcomethatsbiggerthanou

rown.somethingson

lygetswallowed.aboriginesstillbelievethatsatellitesarestars.

thosewhosleepwhentheirdeaddiesoon.

innardscanspanoceans5

maybe meaning’s hiding at the bottom of the ocean. maybe meaning’s nowhere6

(if so, i’m there).

either way i’m sinking, so let’s hold our breath

4 just skip over the next couple of stanzas, it’s a list, the list empty, not the good kind of empty, it’s the kind of empty that robs you of your emptiness to make itself more empty, to make you something less than empty & if you think i’m being funny or that i’m somehow trying to trick you, trust me. you’ll just be disappointed.5 who’d believe that the innards are the emptiness? we need the space between our molecules, we need the space between our mouths & mind.6so much, too much nowhere. what does that even mean? nothing’s void of substance, not even empty substance. everything is buzzing, even outer space is buzzing. even death is buzzing. if meaning doesn’t exist, it has to not exist somewhere.


& keep our eyes open.

sea creatures don’t know love, only currents.the blackest hearts live in the blackest bottoms,

&i’m sinking empty.7

there’s too much truth in guessing.

nothing’s more embarrassingthan boredom.

nothing’s more exciting

than

disappointment.

7 the next bit was adopted after its home was crushed by caterpillars. please treat the line like it belongs. please don’t call it an orphan.

two lefts, a bridge

crossing, then

straight

through

‘til

morning

.

v.

v. 87two lefts, a bridge crossing, then straight through ‘til morning.

we’ll never make it off our rock (all you need to do is breathe).

there’s not an ocean liner. not an ocean, is no line.

you can live your whole life in the same house.

you can die in its basement,

covered in asbestos,

wearing your child clothes,

leaking out a decomposing life, evaporating secrets.

don’t let all the serious problems scare you. you are going somewhere.

as soon as we’re in the throat of the worst.


david’s at the sanitary market. he’s got any eye for bread & beads. maybe a book. maybe an arrow. or maybe a treat.

it’s that time of the year: the time of year for treat. david loves to ice skate, david loves most chocolate, loves love. sundayafternoons at the

sanitary market.

look at the booths: look at all this blanketingexcitement!

events turned, & now he’s hemorrhaging for no good reason, just one bad reason.

eyes as wide as the ocean. blood all over pecans. pecan man rolling over

in a broken open fervency. there goes his livelihood. there goes his child away to college. there goes his wife,

away to senile journey-hood.

there goes,there goes,there goes.

mouthing quiet threats to no avail while drowning in the simulation sea.


david faints at the sight of blood&the thought of pouring buckets.

buckets, wind, flashlights & overturned horses, davidis a fainter.

the meat men shout out, “ambulance!” but the ambulance is out of earshot. anyway, he’s gone deaf by going lovesick,

lost to twiddles, tweets & twirlsin the green of evenings.

won’t ophelia ever see him? won’t ophelia ever see him

for the child that lives inside the parts of himwho never carried so much death across the city?

while david’s losing life:

there’s a million bleeding mouths in forlorn parts of the forlorn world.

there’s a fevering planet, and a neverending cityscape of people, people, people, people,

who can’t even look at each other. during the ambulance lament:


another chunk of the real broke off & melted into the simulation sea. so,

the ambulance is running over girls beside the river,by careless accident. this is turningsuch a renegade love.

the meat men are mourning, such a loss, such a lossof david, whose name was in the biblewhile pecan man only

buries himself in pity, notlooking

at the cure.

look at what you’ve done by not looking,pecan man.

you know medicine, you could have been a hero.

look at what you’ve done by not looking,ambulance.

the modern world invested so much faith in your arrival, what tight clothes we wear.


look at what you’ve done by not looking,ophelia.

your world could have turned into love, albeit dangerous love.

look at what you’ve done by not looking,reader.

bombs are going off, & what are you doing, reading poetry? what am i doing, writing poetry?

look at what you’ve done by not looking for the fish with the razor bladedfins, & their eye for your open, flowing neck,

david.


it’s easy to get clean, but it’s not easy to get reasonable.

when we die we’ll trade our souls

for thesouls of scientists. can thesouls of scientists believe in their own being?

do i believe in mine?

i couldn’t speak at all last february. it was the second longest february

i ever spent not speaking. the first one was a leap year, but the next one will be mine.

i wish you would fall.

when i said that i wish you would fall, i meant it. but i don’t mean it anymore.

i’m glad my wish wasn’t granted. i’m learning to watch my wishes.

if i ever took a year-sized leap i’d end up in an alternate reality,a puddleorfebruary twenty-ninth, nineteen twenty one.

i would give my sister to watch a whale devour my sister.i would give a whale to watch my sister devour a whale.


orin the place that i belong.

what is the longest january i ever spent not speaking? what is the universe for?

there’s nothing worse than not knowing. there’s nothing worse than dying, & knowing that you’ll never knowwhat you’re dying to know.

once i break out of school we’ll be in the movies together, &the whole world will believe we’re playing such wunderkind roles

when really it’s the roles that are playing us.

once i break out of denver we’ll find the soil that we came from,& sink back in.


the way he’s speaking tongues of fate ‘ has got me grounded,

is reminding me of distance.

so much distance stands between us,

so much distance to the center of the stage.

what a body,what a body of concepts,

what an everlasting backdrop to get lost in.

even standing in the shadows there’s a drawing force.

he

never gives a straight face,never gives an honest answer

still,the audience will never, never blink.

the audience is lusting, swooning

for a fool to be buried by the truth of untruth

...in which our everyman finds his place, cowers to the human condition.


& by all the names in the universe, we are all already buried.

his status as a hero makes the human just a foil,

he tells us all what’s missing but he never says what’s left.

so when the curtain falls, we’re left to wonder

what to do,what ghosts to believe in,

what home becomes his hallway after encore.


bolin amalgamation has double vision, so he sees the beauty & dread of the worldas one. in midnight parlors, dreams & cold front avenues ‘ he’s never thought to pry the two apart.

federico blind is nearsighted,which means he hardly sees ‘ a thing.

womb boy stick is overeager. he’s waiting the three months more so he can finally touch the world & any imagebesides the inner-flesh color, red

deathbed thom is overeighty. he’s waiting the three months more ‘ so he may finally leave the world & any image besides the surrender color, ‘‘ white.

hyrum immobility is paralyzed, from the inside out to his legs.he’s sitting in a church pew, just waiting & waiting & waiting. his mouth cries, “sanctuary,” but the words are paralyzed, too.

amalgamations & blindness. wombs, deathbeds, immobility & lovelies. romance, mothers.


lovely mrs. rice is on a bus out of town. she’s in love with the movement, &she’s in love with the sounds. “i’m in love with the movement&i’m in love with the sounds,” is what she writes in her notebook. her notebook is in love with her.

aching boy romance wants to give a new life to his father. without that 20th century struggle, & without the burdens of change. but father wouldn’t change a thing.

mother morley’s dreaming the imaginary: her life as a missionary. she does all the same work at the mission.

‘ but not in any wonderful place.


in war, in this war goliath, in this war against goliaths,

we have lost our every soul.

we can’t tell our children that we’re saving good from evil.we can’t tell our children that we’re good.we can’t tell good from evil.

we’ve been wasting all our wherewithal:the lives of men,dirty bombs & dirtier looks,

&we’ve come to throwing stones.

if only we had known from the beginning

to forget about the bomb. radiation makes them grow.

goliaths march on cities. us men,we march in lines.

if only we had known from the beginningto take down giants with philosophy.to grow giant with philosophy.

we can’t tell our children that we’re good (we’re faint. we’re mice. we’re losing.).


the giant is philosophy.

if only we had known from the beginning WW we’re faint. we’re mice. we’re losing.

in war, in this war goliath, in this war against goliaths,

we have lost our very souls.

david pitched a stone, we’ve pitched a million stones.

david’s stone was wrapped in holy truth. what weapon is a holy truth?


i am walking down this avenue,&there’s a different wayto take eachstep. what makes subtlety half the action, but double themeaning?

&why are all our winters, flag poles subtle? ‘ ‘ these are the problems of our time.too many words to write a letter with ‘ ‘ & a kind of awareness that gives credence to oblivion.

i’m sorry i am not sorry. i’m sated, i am spent.

let’s go north to anacortes. we’ll meet the guru of the mount.maybe we’ll meld into the eerie mountain,&discover truth.

the discovery of truth as eerie mountain. the discovery of truth as ambiguity.


o truth, you are no use in the shape of a mystery. ‘ ‘ you are the key & the treasure, ‘ & neither. o truth, what good is coughing hungry ambiguity? ‘ ‘ ‘’ ‘‘‘‘ ‘ ‘‘’’’ to evolve until your name ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘‘ is not your meaning? o truth, even if you’re dead you’re still a ghost, ‘ ‘ giving speeches in the ether. ‘ ‘ you see invisible lines.

o truth, i don’t need to understand you just to be ‘ ‘ a part of you.


should we be dancing in the streets or burying our dead?

orburying our dances in the garden for a better bloom— —for a no ill omen future?

we should be dancing on our

dead, we should be dancing on our dead

end streets. we’ll host a bloc partyfor all the fallen friends we’d meet on city squareevents like the fourth, new years & harvest week.

we’ll tell them that they meant a lot&that we miss them.

dead, our dead, our dead end streets.


on tightrope walking, from my reality to yours:

i love the nebulous inbetweens, the fear, the polygonal anomalies & the burn of being nowhere.

i’m no homebody & my ‘ body is ‘‘‘‘ no home.

so let’s journey to beyonds, so let’s jump into

so the nebula.

i have a map of our misfortunes—we could avoidunpleasant realities WwW & unpleasant unwWwW realities. ‘ to the plunder, to the mythos of summer: two lefts, a bridge crossing, then straight through ‘til morning. next it’s up.

up,up,up,up,

on tightrope walking, sleepwalking.

what is not

okay

in

dreams

i-v

.

v i .

vi. 107what’s not okay in dreams i-iv

it’s not okay to make love on the trampoline, not in this dream. in this dream i’m just a literary observer.i gave the rules away

because i didn’t know i owned them.

believe you’re ground, you’re grounded.

believe you’re earthedyou’re earth.

believe you’re in the airyou’re underwater;

you’ve just got to know.

it’s not okay to make love on the trampoline, not when mother’s just a window away,not when little brothers sigh

the next yard over,

not when god is peeking like a voyeur.there’s not awnings in between, no forest canopy.

he knows what happens next, &

i.


little did we know he was the firstto enter us.

if only i had known,if only i had known,

so much would have been okay.

if only i had knownwhen to blink.


i learned from dreams it’s not okay

to kiss your cousin,little brother.

she’s got her own life now, besidesyou’re only twelve years old.

she’s going to be a nurse next year, &next year you’ll hit puberty;

diseases come from closeness.the worst disease is baby.

little brother,baby brother, won’t you let me lead you?

the world’s a leering labyrinth,turn after turn after turn,

but always, there’s a way out.

little brother, don’t bend the boundariesdon’t open your mouth,

don’t show your missing teeth. welcome to a world of waiting. everything is up & nothing changes.nothing passes by.

ii.


g

you say you’re a man––when did i blink?

sometimes six years is just a paper cut.

well have at it little brother, open up your eyes for blinding.open up your fists for blistering.

you’ll be judged, but never apprehended.

so break the laws, & marry any invitation.

buy naked magazines, vice & cigarettes, too.

the weight,

the world,

the violence,

the voice:

it’s all on you now.


it’s not okay in dreams or any other place

for cats to explode

wide eyed, unexpected, prolonged,

out of every orifice.

for teeth to draw disaster diagrams out of

blood, out of their brothers’ bone.

for nurses to treat cancer with disease,

“why can’t we cure his sick with song?”

“because that doesn’t work.” for mystics to draw lines on summoned bodies,

iii.


for presidents to meet with puppets,

for discoveries to only close the doors.

for eyes to always stay open.

for maps to lead imagination to the brink.

for the brink to be a circle. for the circle to stop.


it’s not okay in dreams to be ninety percent sure about anything.

& every time you smoke a cigarette, imagine three inches of my heart

are being burned next to your life. your life

is burning, too, you’ve gotsuch a little life to live.

remember that everything’is’nothing,’but nothing’s also everything.

when everyone is frightened, nobody is frightened. when everyone is homesick

‘ everyone is home.

don’t do anything unless you can believe. don’t believe unless you can do anything.

little brother, don’t you know the world? don’t you know the world is not a dream?

iv.


little brother don’t you knowthere are no rules, just words.

follow your heart & hope

you’ve got a good heart.

it’s all you’ve got, is all you’ve got at all.


it’s not okay, it’s not okay, to make anything mean anythingin this dream.

in this dream

i’m falling out.i’m falling out the window, i don’t belong. i don’t belong

in the city, three years old can be suchan upward time,

repeating time, & ‘ time again i can’t stop falling.

i know the end is down & what it means, but something, time again,

outside me, beckonsme.

i don’t know nothing’s real; i knowthe impact will not scratchthe surface

of

v.


my countenance.

my countenance is down& out

the window,

mother, father, come in such a comic frenzy

down& out

the stairs, in silhouettes.

in silhouettes i use my inference to find your countenance.

i know i’m looking coy & cosmic, friendlyagainst the pavement

i know you’re looking petrified

because i’ve seen this scene before.

you will:

take me back to bed in wet pajamas, who would have guessed: in dreams,

we’ll never learn.

it’s not okay, in dreams, to learn.


falling out, my countenance; back in wet pajamas;

repeating time & time again.

i’ll keep this up until i wake up,to a world where nothing ever happens twice.

where i’ll keep an open eye,

a journal,& a poem every day

that’s looking for a pattern we can cling to. i fell so many times this year: clenched fists, gritty impact, is not the same in a world

where anything can happen.

if i know where i’m going, i’ll fall,

but time is always known for keeping. for keeping

her clothes on.

in this dream there never was a first,is how i stomached falling.


time &time again.

in this dream & in this dream & only,

i never didn’t hit the ground okay.

a million hours tall

&

the serpent

as

a walking

stick

.

v i i .

vii. 123a million hours tall & the serpent as a walking stick.

on the evening ‘ when we’re eaten

just keep kicking it in the throat until you’re too much trouble. keep inhaling someone’s hungry breath because:

as soon as we’re in the throat of the worst we are safe.as soon as we’re in the throat of the worst just keep breathing.

nothing worse can happen.

as soon as we’re in the throat of the worst just keep breathing.


welcome back. how old are you these days? your back is bent like you were fifty, but you still can’t grow a beard. that makes it hard to say.

what’s got you so anxious? i heard what you did—have you al-ways been so anxious? have you always been so looking down, so looking at the same black photographs?

& what happened to your body? it’s growing hairs where no one would have guessed. turn the lights out once & everything changes. i blink & you’re becoming someone else.

but are you still being trampled by imaginary beings?—it’s good to know your enemy. are you still imagining being trampled?

are you still breaking up from when you learned the ways that a human body decays?

it might help to remember that no moment dies, only you die.

life is a train & each moment is a road sign that you squint to read but the print is too fine & the train is moving so quickly.

you’ll die on the train, but the train is eternal like the road signs. you’re the only thing that isn’t eternal, you’re the only thing in this metaphor that dies.

except that somewhere you’re still nine years old. & thirteen, fifteen, seventeen…

this metaphor is breaking up.


somewhere you’re still a boy in short shorts, stuck in a world of long pants.

you’re still a face covered with disease on a roller coaster; every moment’s stamped into existence, like shadows in a nuclear explosion.

you need sleep; you’re looking thin. i hope you know that i like you, & it’s not my fault about these things. let’s not harbor any bad feelings toward each other.

i really do like you, as much as i like myself.

i’ll admit that you’re a mess, a mess as opposed to clean. you’ve been a mess since the beginning. since you as a concept. the con-cept for you was, “let’s make something that’s a mess.”

& everything else is a mess. the whole world is a mess. the whole world is in decay. all you want to do is not make a bigger mess.

remember you’re minute, & that nothing you do could ever change a thing. look at the big picture. where do you fit in?

remember that this is the most important time to be alive, & every move you make is burdened by the weights of heavy conse-quence.

i hope you know that the world will keep turning even if it’s de-serted. even if it’s destroyed.

but if you’ve got to deal with hurricanes, it’s best to be the eye.

when did things become so complicated? since the beginning? what’s so great about beginnings? what’s that consciousness crush all about, that’s so fitted into your being?


i’m sure you’re one to admire life from a microscopic point of view, or an intergalactic one. i’m sure you’re one to admire their similarities.

can’t life just be motion? can’t it just be amoeba twitches, or the occupation of space? you wouldn’t need to worry about the world spinning backwards, or imaginary beings, voids.

but the answer is no. no it can’t. life is a train & you’re on the train. the train is derailing. the train is crashing into road signs, you’re being flung to the unknown, & you are alone.

this metaphor is breaking up.

you’ll feel fine about decay eventually (everyone does, nobody does). in the meantime keep inviting those fears in. give them all a hammer. let them break your will.

that will make it easier on you, trust me. besides, you’ve got to die sometime. you’ve really, really got to.


the clock is out of strength, she cannot bear to turn her second hand,so she’s been shuddering for days

between the end & the beginning of a moment.

the moment hasn’t slept for days, which is the price she pays

for lingering.

how can we dance into the winter of this dying winter?with arms that hiss, with kissing’mouths,’after’what we’ve seen?

who could grant us movement while the world is still?

while the world is stillimmobile?

who can ever dance to the sounds of thunder?

it’s good to hear your name inside a setting. ‘‘ ‘ inside a setting

that’s beyond my trembling mind.

while the world is still immobile.


it’s good to hear you spoken of with certainty,i misplaced all my certainty inside the mouth of mother dawn, who disappeared.

who ever said that faith was synonymous with comfort?

the winter grounds keep shrinking, but it’s still winter in our hearts.

we’re still stuck inside this moment,we’re still holding the same breath

& waiting for what happens next.

if the world has really got to end, like all the faking artists sayi’d rather watch a show than a degrade.

if the world has got to end i hope it’s under the discretionof someone who knows when to pull the curtain.


i learned some definitions in the classroom. i learned that carelessness is bravery

& that bravery is an open mouth. the open mouth—apparently—is safety.

what i’ve learned from growing up is:

always, you’re the last one left.

i’m thinking of when we were tangled. i couldn’t help but notice: with the way we overlapped

& with the rhythm of our breathing,

we sure did make the perfect pairof lungs.

how i learned to shake hands is from shaking,how i learned to throw a fit is based on throwing parties.

i’ve got so many photographs, with all the different otis pigs.i could build a wall with otis pigs,

but what i really need to do is build a house.

what i’ve learned from memory is: forget the most important things.

how i learned to be half of the perfect pair.


the things that you forget, they’ll follow you.they’ll watch you when you sleep, & send you poems from the spirit world at bedtime.

safety is believing there’s a disease. safety is the blinking eye, the hurricane.

safety’s being an absolute, being absolutely certain about any-thing.

just jump (you’ll be okay), on anything that carries weight.just jump. you’ll be okay

on anything.


who is a good year, is a terrible year, is a turn for the worst, is a turn.

who is the weight of magic on the magician, who is the muscian’s tears.

who is mattress train wrecks into government movement. who is confusion made from people wearing wrong rings.

who is the comfort nations’ awing at explosions made to watch. who is the sovereign nations’ shaking off explosions that worsen

vision.

who is a toothache out of monsters vs. a document made out of limbs.

who is alligator motives foiled by a shot with the medicine gun.

who is a world of david bowies writing letters to the moon.who is wearing masks & dancing to the garrison song.

who is the thick lip gone away & her lonely life of luxury.who is the aching in my heart but not from love, maybe cardio-

vascular disease.

who is an evening of trembing hands.who is a morning bone that bends for no one.

who is a poison pin surrender after meeting with the microscope. who is another raccoon run for james––belittled but alright.

tricked, but learning.

listen & the human condition (tells us a piece of her name)


who is teeth inside of mouths inside of atoms.who is hands inside of gloves inside of ovens.

who is larry’s own voice caught between worlds when he finally admits everything.

who is not looking when the whole world is looking thanks to headphones.

who is twilit on the open sea waiting for a morning land of dis-coveries.

who is the open, open outer space & so much, so many opens.

who is john pink fading months away on the top of floor thirteen.who is gawking at the gawker in a mirror world turning infinite degrees.

who is sore from bird coughs, maybe getting better.who is alive at last, is the very last alive.

who is vincent price’s longing for a trap door reanimation. who is a broken vase, a broken ruth, a mother’s day with consequences.

who is taking all our wings when we are sleeping.who is waking with a missing set of wings.

who is all of your mistakes.who is all of your forgets.

who is forgetting your mistakes.who is mistakes that you forgot.

who is a line that never ends in the paradox mathematic.who is a dive into the waterfall that’s nowhere.


who is condom juice that’s leaking from a tree inside an urban fence.who is the boy that can’t wear socks in the summer thanks to how his feet swell.

who is the dubious note on a keyboard that foreshadows twisted ankles.

who is the gray and fading landscape for the fainting.

who is the man in white? the man outside your window?who is not the man in white? who wouldn’t want to wait outside

your window you’re so nice.

who is aware that we are poets just by grinning? who is aware that we are poets just by falling into the void of

eyes?

who is waiting with a hand for every shake.who is sleeping on the floor with folded knowledge.

who is not a part of this, is all of this.who is ready when you are, is ready for a change of pace.

who is concrete.who is gaseous.

who is caught in the middle.who is caught outside the middle with a hand of jelly.

who is god’s right hand whenever god extends his hand.who is turning his whole life away from god’s extended hand.

who is searching for the bomb inside a cabinet.who is searching for egyptians at the bottom of the sea.


who is tired of injustice always downwinding her.who is ready to sleep this one out, this whole generation.

who is taking turns with thread telephones across neighbor win-dows.

who is the bravest, kindest twelve-year-old father in the world.

who is dreaming in the groove where giants fell.who is vomiting fits for the sake of what she saw somebody eat.

who is a cut-off wing limping through the world of ghosts like a message in a bottle.

who is inviting progressive science in for dinner, never mind the traps, the self-destruct device.

who is a castle out of petrified looks.who is dostoevsky thrown out the bathroom window by big, bad-mouthing future.

who is the jump before the fall, the bad idea. who is taking a right turn for wrong reasons.

who is watching sunspot storms for clues, is going blind. who is lost after losing a stomach full of cake.

who is a record that’s spinning the way the world is spinning.who is a tape that’s winding the way your anxious life is winding.

who is never going to sleep again, loves living halfway, loves noth-ing being real (or so it seems).

who is sliding down in pairs, is sharing static.

who is keeping promises only from behind the curtains. who is keeping sentiments in a sandwich bag.


who is gazing at ground to the turning century’s heartbeat murmur. who is living the life that pregnant people do.

who is understanding ephemeral lives as a chameleon stage replaying.

who is mauled apart in the alley for beliefs that make sheep cough.

who is trying to believe, is trying to believe in trying. who is your mother’s tears, what could be worse than actually

being a person?

who is the rhythm that condemns a bruise to hipsters that don’t mean it.

who is modest but aware of such a glowing, unchecked power.

who is still alive in the olive trees of greece, look out for history. who can’t survive another life support process, waves miracle recovery.

who is never going to dream another double life again. who is one hundred yards of memory, is a resolute surrender.

who is the name that no one looks for in the phone book. who is the hand that opens doors to empty hallways.

who is the home we all belong to when we’re children. who is the tomb we travel centuries to die in.


& the teenage mouth explorers trade their countenance for & comfort because one of them is leaving off to war& mccauley’s in a stupor because his glasses have gone missing, & now, how else will he read without them there? & rose is picking flowers to give to danced out senioritas so her& heart won’t hate her body anymore& there’s a red beast in the corner who says he’s lonely, but on & purpose, still, he wouldn’t mind a rose or rose’s heart& boy gabe is barely breathing ‘cause he was blind & wandered & out to where the driver knocked him down & disappeared& so his mother just keeps sobbing ‘cause she had plans for & sunday morning; she thinks god & him should not have met& so soon & now the train screams in the distance like it has always done at & twilight; it’s going west to make this last more than it should & watch sebastian on the rooftop; he’s got a certain glow about & him––if he jumped right now he’d never come back down& kathleen who goes to college is reading poems by the & lamppost & she wishes she had hands to write her own& the towers in the distance cry, “we’re insecure about our future,& now that all our friends keep falling down”& there’s an aeroplane above us & it is hauling balls to portland; & inside is ozzy osbourne looking down& old jane is in the kitchen; she’s singing hymns her children & taught her; they go “time is on our side is on our side”& now that arthur’s painting portraits his friends all think he’s & crazy for the piece he did on christ called wait & see & the birthday girl decided her balloons belonged in heaven, so & she lets them fly & turn to silhouettes.

twilight as a world of final actions which are waiting for the night.


come outside your house, there’s oxygen to breathe. there is space between the molecules.there are worlds & lives

exchanging.

there are lights in the sky,look up!

there are explosions made to watch,let’s watch.

there are glows in each expression,

in the beautyof mobility.

when the serpent is straight, we’ll use him as a walking stick.

there are old wounds opening on the back of the beast.

we’ve got the diagrams,

we’ve got stones & holy truth, so please,

we don’t have to live in the dark anymore.


come out of your house.

everything is okay, even when it’s not.everything is not okay, which is okay.

we will all die, look up!

all our love will decompose, look up!

our land is shrinking inches every day, look up!

look up, orlook

at your fears.they can’t bite you if they’re already biting you.

we can march in lines a million hours tall with the serpent as a walking stick.

but where will we go?

there are moments when we find a face in chaos,

& we see the great big joke of everything. we can shake hands with the universe.

he says he’s known us all along.

g

you can come outside your house,there’s still an open mouth that’s waiting,

but we’ve got to have a face before we can face it.


we don’t have to die today, unless we do.

we don’t have to live

in the sleepwalker’s labyrinth,

in the suburbs of concern,

in the simulacra cycle,

in the sunken sea,

in the lout’s

alley.


in the dark.


in the dark

anymore.

for the longest time i didn’t know what was what. every-one just held poses like in some kind of statue gallery.

their eyes were drowning in sleep, but i couldn’t just reach my hands out and rub it from them. i would have lost my balance. i’d probably still be falling.

every morning, the first face i’d meet was indecision: “did i really wake up? is this really what it feels like to be alive?” is what i would say to the mirror.

every mirror seemed warped––or worse, seemed bro-ken.

either i was daydreaming about sleepwalking, or just plain sleepwalking. who ever really knows?

who ever knows?

some time passed, & when i finally woke up the feet of postmodernism were rotting away beneath my window. finally i can believe again, that the weight of our house will always kill the witch.

what places are the unlikely ones? are there any left––i can’t remember. where will we go now? of course we’re lost, but at least we’re alive.

serpents, throats & goliaths. satellites, beasts & hur-ricanes. these are the bodies of unstoppable beings.

any minute now, they will meld together into a giant megazord. their heels will come down on your country. their tails will sweep time from the floor.

if there was a hero in this story, he’d shout “but bodies have nothing to do with it.” & then die at our feet; his face in his hands, his hands in the mud.

if the whole world believes the world is going to end, the world is going to end.

if we believe they can be stopped––

epilogue. the bodies of unstoppable beings.