Poetry

He walks back from the
                                         window in half-shadow

a half-shade himself

The day moon the
                                     spirit of the morning

The girl seems to fly
the hawk above her, a kite of feathers

Two seats away, my father watched
the tenor study the world that rumbled
parallel to his window: crumbling

The woman saves every heart- or wing-
shaped rock she finds, studding the mountain 

To protect the instrument, she spent all night
gesturing at plates or nodding yes to the glass of white. 

We are tired of arguing about who is the most hurt.
Better to toddle off for a little Chinese.
The locust flowers each year like cornmeal in the gutters.

Spark, then fire begins. Fire pulls oxygen
deep into the box. Come, child, there’s something
I’d like to show you in the back of this

I am born. I dream the nightroom of your body,
and in that place, you sing, build me of words