Previsto: antes del conocer al desierto

Dry heat stings and scorches
burns my bones
Buzzes like a live wired vulture.
Drinking sand, breathing dust
deflating rubber, beaten tire.
The desert wind
blistering lizards
aching to hide in
canyon shadows.

Teeth

Fearful
worried
mortal
Tell stories of candied palaces
and hope that is what he's dreaming about
repetition
causation
micro
macro
dreadful space of reality
knotted stomach, knotted back
nausea
sweat illness
deaf to nothing blind to nothing
why unveil consciousness
pray
mortal space
atoms colliding
feathers colliding
friction
bones, years, millions of them
mother son me
shake listen
yearn to revert to my youthful ignorance
open light
close - flying 3-D shaped morphing
memory of her
blue, soft, sad
bells
baths
wet grass
shouts cries flowers baseball
muddy skinned knees
perfume
cigarettes
robes satin pink
gravy
wallpaper weak moving
heads against walls
eyes organic saline
milk
vomited bananas and applesauce
5 am twilight
5 am pitch black
running across wet grass
umbrellas blown inside out
wondering about structures
and sleepwalking
Christmas
hysteria torn skin
chipped teeth broken
wooden spoons
mother OD'd on floor
breast hanging out
men pills
creaking breaking
down
sister falling
catching rain
gardens being watered
constant
remembrance
decent normal
she makes straight As
and gets locked in the basement.
cookies
pretzel rods birthdays

Maggie

now, then, then

I am
now
in my bed
after a days work
listening to my
son breathe.

I have been
alone.
In a bed
after a few drinks
listening to my
lovers heave.

I will be
then.
With my chosen
other self
listening to our
bodies be.

3rd layer nostalgia

In the hour when the sun
has yet to be fully seen
sleep still hanging all around me
the whir of the fan, the morning numbness
of my body.
The room fills with gray light.
Eyes open, eyes close, where did my dream go?
Somewhere in between warm sleep and
this autumn morning I lost my dream
of Paris.

Of black clothes, cafe avec creme, le Louvre.
Ianesco, wiry intellects contemplating my
adequate enough American figure.

You were there drinking wine and coffee -
staining your teeth in perfect European style.
You were there, Mr. American. Tall,
unassuming, relaxed.

Eyes open, eyes close, open again to the gray
room by myself, in middle America
worrying about starting the cycle of
coffee, work, dinner, bed.

Bed after Hot Bath

Skin hot, muscles liquid
soft, white, warm
air blowing on my
naked body.
Turn over, then around,
lift up my hair.
Twitch, contract, stretch, sleep.

The rich, complex, ancient sound of music
sliding soothingly down the canals of my soul
to the roots of my being

A fifth century redwood
arms like strong branches
reach out to the tones, over and under
weaving stiffly around the cool rhythms
moistening, becoming supple and
new when the warm, red hollow notes
once again find their homes
for the spring

Warm

My sould wants to dance, to become fluid, to clap.
A red skirt, a sunflower
High-heeled, brightly dressed dark woman.
Acoustic guitars, gypsies.
Boys named Juan, Pedro, Giancarlooo, ooh
watch with big brown eyes.
The dry heat making the outside of the glass drip drop down
onto the cheap plastic table
on the terrace