the Compromise

Yes, this is a perfect life,
bubbling plasticene strife.

If immolation, it is a slow
one. "Maybe the hectare further,"

to "or at least mental absentia
turned to much sleep." in the interim.

The cul-de-sac is indignant, yes.
"Maybe there is a third side

of life." The reaffixed bonnet's
bundled under. It is quite cold.

Met you when I'd come to on
the waning half. Picture this;

me, maybe fiveteen percent to
ineptitude with a nosegay of irises.

Let's compromise: you can have
the whole city if I can die.

Compartmentalize, obfuscate, lie
to yourself and everyone else. Skin

spate when there is a shortage
of flesh. Flash mate when

it is dark and we have strobing eyes.

Gliese

On Sunday we gnawed
blood and chokecherry.

The platelet bore
phosphorus to arsenic

and we ate nightshade.
On a colder heath than

one supposed.


Braised boulders in
wizened eye-corner skin,

metal, threadbare Lem.


And this is an anxiety thing,
too, flash of bright red hair;

talons of it. Then we
macerated galloping reams

of numbers ticking up.
What was ground dust

was not dust, but verdurous.
Cataloguing what chlorophyl

strobed back: "green/
green/green/green/green."


Evenings we foundered.
Having rounded some

inanity corner and
doe-faced the grins down,

feigning ignorance
of one another.

As though we were all
clean-shaven, irony gone too.

"Yes." "My, you have
a special that," "I think

you would really enjoy
this record," or, "track of land."

And it's reciprocal!

Earth

The paradigm is
life ended in parts;

no extraneous tree
pulp, increased

purview of machines
(for numerous reasons),

fewer trips
to the theater—

fewer theaters.
Children would say

“You are so old now,”
dividing things up like that.


You came back. Know
what cement set?

Quite flat. With horizontal
scrape marks on it.


This was us.
More dense, if

judging things like that
makes any sense. Blittery

rabbit cooked on speed
and crystal meth,

(That is a blatant attempt...
and all that) rhombus

or a parallelogram;
this was our house.

Transparent, platonic
line segments. Then

lifting the foot over
the bootland to fair

farther foothills and
flat land fractally

explosive with
things that grow.


Designs for cities in the Gulf.
The seagull joke,

neither we
were “aqueous” people.

the Long Haul

Stumbling out
done with the

existence
responsibility.

"I don't even know if this
is worth it anymore."

Bradley began blathering
after hibernation.

The good air
was either too hot

(jockey shorts) or
unmitigatedly frigid,

(the toggle wool coat
and leather duffle bag) but

it kept moving.
From the solar

north pole
into night.


Cruel crunch of
not putting the finger on it.

Something was not right,
yes.

If murderous,
the implication must oblique

into a late morning meal.
Everyone huffing eggs.

"I did not offer you the scarf
to be the boss!" the latrine is

a ways off south. Maybe
Div going there accidentally.

Maybe the social tree
grew deep roots in dust too fast.

And! between
twilight,

leaning left
if going west!

the sun will set
if you let it.

Less jouisance
than was talked about

because less vitamin D
from the ultraviolet light.

Brass fittings, the D-
ring opening. And

through a hard vacuum or
gravity, Div Bradely-Notworthit

faded into death. His desiccated
husk in the saltfields between

the great northward
rivers.

When They Evacuated the Louvre in Advance of Nazi Troops

You, barefooted beauty.
Winged Victory, you

descent fast.

Creeping past old embers
and broken glass back.

That that

happened years ago
was not immediately

apparent.

It seems to be
going on still.

Precipitous Drop

Broke, did not know
the handmade catamaran
was full of reedworm, not
in love, overriding the first
stanchions, little red book,
breathe deep when "what're
you doing now?" whether
the good IPO went south
and you couldn't get out
or did—with fungal aplomb
—and balls to the wall and
making "being very famous"
and "life easening" of cold
photographic chemicals and
and an old Helmut Newton
coffee table book.

David

The primary pulmonary embolism
started in the leg

and moved to the lung later,
after two weeks of bed rest.

Increasingly the healthy corpus
is not the healthy corpus one

remembered leaving
on the sofa (yellow leaves and

paisley orange, a little brown).
You fell down.


Irradiated you,
staying a long time,

as though Elijah had arrived.
You died.