pollen

every animal has its own way 
of writing its name. humans build
towers to poke holes in the sky.
horses run the length of a field--
leaving hoof-prints in fresh mud.
bees scoop up pollen--taking yellow
into their small hands & searching
for flowers that remind them 
most of their mothers. bowing to a breeze.
pollen coated the outside of my car
on the last days i saw you. you drew 
a heart in the dust. we blinked 
future fruit from our eyes. 
drank sodas in the front seat
with the windows shut. you talked
like only deer do. ready to run
deep into wooded curtains. your eyes
like signatures. ink whirling 
all the way to bone. i used to practice
writing my name on napkins & notebook paper.
that was before i discovered my mouth.
planting my name on your neck.
you said you were growing
a family of potted plants. i imagined
being the father of plum trees
with you. there was enough sugar
to keep our wants caramel & dripping.
dew spitting letters onto my canvas shoes.
everything was damp. i never used 
the extra closet space. simply filled it
with empty boxes. names upon names.
the backyard where you asked 
if i had a space ship anywhere.
sighed & said, "not yet."
the bees hovered, watching. 
re-collecting their pollen. asking
if you were their mother. inside
before you left, you drew a portrait of me
using only forks. i asked, "am i smiling?"
you said, "only if you want be."
i find your name still in crossword puzzles 
& written in pollen on my desk.
a single bee the keeper of my regrets.
is a name a capsule or a lectern?
you road a sun beam back 
to before i knew you.

mutual

requited palm in the bee hive.
my hands evolved to honey. sticky
between fingers. golden words
spit at your teeth like brick walls.
all i had in the parallel you.
i lift my arm. you lift yours.
oceans reduced to blankets & sheets.
sleeping monsters clasping hands.
your breath a shared engine. we could
have been one palace. i go in with
a diamond shovel. unearth the quartz
& dinosaur teeth. you sigh.
planets crack open to reveal 
their dragons. this is all i could
ever want. to watch you & to watch me.
the symmetry of birch trees 
& their water reflections. no more rooves,
rain comes down on us in bed. 
thunder tossing candles from shelves.
nothing will ever burn again after this.
what if i broke the rice paper curtain 
& kissed your back? planted tulip bulbs
on your neck? i want to hear you ask
for more than the moon could carry.
i will crawl on all fours for years
because of you. we laugh like only 
copper-rich fountains can. i'm laying tile
on every wall i find. these are our shoulders.
this is both our bed.

milk bowl

i drank from the hard drive
as deeply as i could. nose damp
with cream. in the pasture, all the cows
gossiped about being replaced 
by machines. i kept a plastic straw 
in my pocket just incase there was
a tall glass of ivory. elephants 
have taken to playing pianos 
as an act of reclamation. i know my bones
will not last the next earth quake.
it is dangerous to attach yourself
too much to your flaws. i hold my mistakes
by their hands & walk them down to the creek.
a heron sells used watches. by body
no longer swallows. instead, i stack quarters
underneath my tongue. everyone has a designated 
parking meter. a quarter per day. it is not known
what would happen if you don't pay. i woulod like
to find out. nothing happens anymore. even clouds
are kneeling & praying for a second winter.
i for one wouold like nothing more than a hail storm.
only, i want the hail to be glass. the sky
the mirror it was always supposed to be.
if i could go the rest of my life without hunger
there would be nothing else to be afraid of.
will you dine with me from the cermaic bowl.
the stray cats have a practice of drinking
the moon's shadow from a bowl of water.
lay down with me. let us be feline
or at least carnivores. my teeth
are thimbles of blood. the year is old.

self portrait w/ my autism

it feels dangerous to write about you
using sound. the way water waves "goodbye."
here is the upstair-neighbor's laughter
knotted in your hair. a siren making a ramp
of your shoulders. you used to be arrow-like
how you shot yourself through crowds 
of shins. telephone wires intercepted 
your fears & turned them into birds.
how often you felt yourself slowly drifting
like a fog receeds back to its ocean nest.
a party in which no one but you has lips.
then another party in which everyone but you
has lips. the texture of socks turning to sand.
cardboard box where you used to believe in god.
taking a walk away from the house 
& counting mail boxes until they become omens.
ceiling tiles wink at you. the secret is
purple & it curls up infant. you live in rooms
like powerpoint slides. i keep promising
to be less cruel. i want to look at you & see
trestles instead of turnstyles. a checkpoint
where i can inspect all the mistakes of the day.
the anograms of shopping lists. my skin 
breathing a sigh of relief to see a blanket
monsterous as me. repeting the phrase
"june bug" until summer arrives. 
you sit alone at a picnic table. your hair
feels long but is as short as it can be.
when you say "sensory" you always mean "sing."

lithium mine

in a green square i saw
future wire zoos. knots of eager. 
i want to get tangled in 
the gold of my ideas. a fragment
asked where i had learned to write 
using ogham. i learned from my blood
& the work of upside down trees. 
the ladders lead into blue fields. 
energy is always coming to the surface. 
workers talk to the water. sweep the souls
of tomorrows electricty. my body 
is a breeding ground for crystals.
find them on the roof of my mouth.
bitter & then sweet. sustenance 
to make it through the landscape's trials.
geese cut through my notions of season.
we all need the source & the source
learns our names. my reflection 
in hopscotch words. a tongue
wide enough for mirrors. we once opened
the guts of a machine to find 
a gallery of gems. the quilt was made
for fire eating. a hook to hang jackets.
hymnals floating beneath. tinged 
with the glee of wrongful discovery.
schemes of extraction. tell me how
you would like to be stolen from.
the earth splays her legs open.
with a knife i kiss both thighs.
batteries on a vine. i push one
into the back of a lover's neck. 
they tell me they've been tired
for so long. they thank me for voltage. 
praise the harvest. the field teems.
blue rash on our hands. dropping marbels 
& watching them sing away.  

in a dream, i have a daughter & she calls me "mother"

so i bury her underneath the pine tree
alongside goldfish bones & cicada skeletons.
winter is full of holes & i spill out all of them.
she was soft like risen dough. un-baptized.
swaddled in newsprint like a fish. 
lately, i have been thinking about children.
on a bookshelf, i build a tiny replica 
of my bedroom in my parent's house.
bunk beds grow wild in the park 
where i walk & witness children
summoning demons beneath the jungle gym.
i used to do the same. hair wracked with 
wood chips. she was so hungry.
drank deeply from a bottle 
as i sat holding her. telling her
we come from a long line of haunted boys.
asking my body what it could know
about fatherhood. she does not know
how to cry & i do not teach her.
says it again later from beneath
the soil. calling me "mother."
but that is not me so i back away
from the wreckage. every time she crawls free.
sits like a centerpiece 
on the kitchen table. wriggling
or wrything. tell me the difference
between motherhood & grave-tending.
my gender grows as a birch tree
& then burns like a bush. nothing speaks.
only fire. we warm ourselves by it.
i feed her gold coins. later, 
we will take a road trip to a crater.
eat the cores of apples. wash my hair
in thunderstorm breath, trying 
to lose my "mother."

t-rex graveyard 

under the cvs parking lot
is a prehistoric dream.
as a girl, i walked there barefoot
in patterns around green & brown glass.
felt their foot prints widening beneath.
we have no evidence t-rex buried their dead
but i know they did. gathered 
in circles. trees burning with grief.
how can our words animate a world
before their own existence? even t-rex
had five different ways of saying "kinship."
t-rex language too was knit 
without past or present. the gathered
& the soon to gather. i love most 
the places where only poetry can enter.
here is ancient mourning. here is 
the body of a creature becoming only bone.
i don't know if i want to be a t-rex
but i do know when i sense them 
in the parking lot i can't help but believe
i've made some mistake. here i am 
with plastic bags. bottles of elsewhere.
feet no longer bare. my body nothing but
a femur. ghost rain washing their bodies.
stories of the oldest feathers. 
then, i think, will an animal someday 
sense me & my bones. crave a living room
& mirages of caskets. think to themself
"i could have been a human, but instead
i am this." t-rex had four chambered hearts
the size of pigs. i have a handful of dirt.
t-rex are gathering & gathered & soon
to arrive. dusk falls early because its winter.
i return home. see their shadows
conjured by street lights.

axe throwing

my god was a fire puppet.
they said we were lucky to get out alive.
gripping your laughs by the handle.
ending are never as precise 
as i want them. i collect buttons
in a sweater pocket in case 
i need to close a hole in the atmosphere.
we paint the target on your back.
ring after ring. you become celestial 
in our shared dream of exaction.
here is where i stop loving you
& we become ex-comets. you post
on facebook a meme that jokes
about dying. we are the family
of nero's violins. in the air an axe 
whirls. propellor & orbit-maker.
the blade that comes around again
& a again. sharpness of planets.
each thins to the body of
a pairing knife. cleaves the space-dark
like a black nectarine. i am so hungry 
for a bullseye. perfection. you turn
on your heel & become an orchard.
i collapse as a heap of firewood.
send smoke in the shape of stringrays.
ocean buttons her waves. 
a field of targets. you want me
to call you to say goodnight.
i can't. the phone is a dragon tongue bean
or else the handle of an axe. 

bowling ball hole

i learned how to enter
from the brass revolving door.
the world grabbed me by the skull.
everything was round but especially
my failures. i floss my teeth with
electric wire. learn to be unbothered
by wind turbines. every movement 
is an opportunity for profit & that includes
the growth of trees. we'll make use of it soon.
for now i see the sidewalk specimens 
& think "what a waste of yearning."  
i was a cow in a previous life & every color 
laughed green. we go bowling together
& outside the sky fills with ash.
the world's end is mundane at this point.
someone takes a picture to use 
as their phone background. we want to remember
exactly what it felt like to play 
when there are no more weights left
to throw. we're being held by 
three little holes. i drill grips 
in the hallway. standing still. ring 
around my neck. i have seen where pins bloom
in ragged fields on dead men. smooth 
even in their dirt. nothing will stop
the coming clutter. something to do
with family. fingers longer than 
my mother's & shorter than my fathers.
i lay down in the gutter of my old futures.
let the machine guess who or what is next.
our shoes are clean enough
to eat off of. a skull is spat 
from the tunnel. we are playing 
in the realest world now. 

sleep lessons

i consult stones for their knowledge
only to find they are not resting at all.
exerting themselves to exhaustion.
"i won't keep you," i tell them.
inside my skull are balled up socks 
& an abandonded water park 
from outside of the town where i grew up. 
i keep most of my wreckage private.
tend a burn pile. leaves escaping 
in a gust of wind. ash-kissed flags.
we search the ceiling like a map
when it comes to this. gathering 
the room up. there is a pocket
for anything. to want something 
means you do not truly have it.
sleep turns into a golden calf
& runs the city ragged. 
we keep the curtains closed for fear
the creature will find us & demand 
payment. he does not know 
how to rest either. i ask my partner 
if she knows what the tallest building 
in the city is & she says it is 
the memory of a giant birch tree.
i fill a bowl with dirt.
put my ear the soil, 
trying to hear their music.
my body thrums. becomes a roost 
for bats. thousands of them 
in each of my shadows. the sun
tenses like a squinted eye.
light spills honey-like & loud 
across the morning sidewalk.