The Living World

The Living World

The living world was not the dead one we found at first;
abandoned like a bride, in the garden of home.
Now I am an old woman, and have learned to see
things as they are and are not.

Desire is an inconstant mirror
held by red hands for the houris of the hour
Today I left my house for a walk, and found
each tree a totem of Christ the Redeemer

II.

April comes; beloved does not come.
the fruit rots, the spring lies fallow
  and a heartbeat chimes again within the cadaver.

Desire is misery, and life. Each day
we rise to greet the blaspheming sun
and decipher the entrails:
hacked and masticated bodies
washed down the gutter with the rains.
With the spring's earth-turning, the dead also bloom,
and then zombie love wracks the garden.

III.

Christ roars like a god in the inner ear of the dead
the trees are penetrated
up to the tips of their nails;
The vines pine, and twist away into undergrowth
...
Today I left the house early, to go walking
something fell from my eyes

Beloved

Untitled

for S. H. M.

The beloved moves through moving smoke
through halls of peroxide, kitchens of silk
her laughter soaks
through slaughterhouse floors;
In bursaat and springtime, her ripe scent
brings the young men running--
from streets and fields, to her butcher's garden.

The heart of the world
cries out for its beloved: Our Lady of Cruelties, I glimpse her face
in each passing cry of leaves, along the highways;
in the jaws of language: alive, even now
A jouissance in the grimace, a red hunger
climbing the bored wind.

This parody
will not contain her.

Untitled

Reflections on Marat-Sade and the Public Library

Every tree bears a horn,
attests to the growth of a notion: thrusting upward,
above ground. The horizon is cut
with his male sword.
The water is spread with words.
In the forest of forms, men slash and burn
stung by their own bereavement.
But the sky is so intelligent–
weaving its computer graphics over the howl
of human night in the eternal city-state. The mass of men drink, dwindling to basest instincts
which is not chaos, but first ground:
a swarm of zeros and ones, a distressingly reasonable
copulation.
(Iblis offers an apple, the sun, in his right hand
while attempting, with the left, to conceal his nakedness
with a small, twinkling fistful of words and gestures.)
Everything withers to simplicity, the most salacious abstraction.

II.

Incense rises with the gibberish. The eon itself-the fat of time-colludes.
In the cafe, sun-fall. From the semiurban streets,
shrieks of dejection, carnal joy.
Another cripple is birthed, another breast
withheld.

It is closing time now, but I am left
only with questions:
Are all the sweeteners in this shop
artificial?
What kind of fathers are rising
in the eyes of these children? What kind of sun sets
behind the bloody pines?

Christmas Song (Song Demo)

New demo, folks--complete with indie "vocals" + out of tune, five-string guitar. (I haven't gotten hosting figured out yet, so unfortunately, all files are currently on zshare--you'll have to bear with me...)

Trees! Part I (Photography)

Most of these were taken in my parents suburban Birmingham neighborhood. The two immediately below are from a nearby construction site I staked out a couple days ago. I'm not sure if I captured it completely, but I really liked the branches' spidery look...

"Hey Bridesmaids"

"Hey Bridesmaids"

Hey bridesmaids, its spring:

The leaves are rotting on the trees

The ground is soaked, the sky

Molds over with clouds. So,

Enough already-

Leave the gaps gaping. Don’t

return the gaze, pick up the phone. Leave

your drink on the nightstand,

next to the scissors and wicks.

Put the yellow pages away. Abandon the den

to its own devourings: choose the highway.

The side lights tower over: alien beacons,

speeding you forward--towards what cold portal?

Get your neighbor to tell him,

if he ever comes a-knocking

fired up with false cheer, at August’s gilded window:

“You made me wait.

Nobody makes me wait.”

after O’Connor

Driving Song

Driving Song

Somewhere on the way back from the shop, I forgot

the names of all the roses

the size and shape of my vehicle

The trees and brush by the roadside gathered speed,

and began to pass me by

The yellow streetlights blushed and breathed

like some huge, translucent

deep-sea creature

The world had taken leave of the senses

The stain on the seat-cover

blossomed gradually

Noisy lights brushed the tops of trees,

and the radio itself

started to talk and talk and talk

Then

I was a word, loosed from the Webster's

lexicon

I was a frat boy, fallen from pride, drink, and the Fall

I was a catamite, with no tamed serpent to ring

around my finger

I had sinned against the Holy Ghost

But the engine drove me home, and parked

in front of the throne by the TV set,

which I calmly refused to watch,

because I felt

that somewhere you were standing

very close to me

that you were staring over my shoulder, somewhere beyond

this boundless, sounding dark

waiting to pronounce my names,

to tease out meanings from the skein

and tangle of this indigence―

to welcome my good looks, disfigurement, and grace

And I loved you for it, incompletely, in advance.