(cover art by Thaddeus Conti)

 

Ars Memoriae

to experience a thrill zone or a patina

approaching rembrandt

the mnemonist

takes a truncheon for a hat

 

The Science of Forgetting

to take part in tumult in a place

or shining, getting close

to Tiepolo, the mind of the one

who forgets all

out of his pants fall genitals

 

 

---

Preface to a Near Full Moon

in the ear of hypnotized sleep

the corked bottle is knocked over

a series of giant tarantulas

pass one after the other

the transparent apple dreams

of lace & down feathers

“Here’s to us!”

neither Paris nor Homer

can say it better

the oak the almond the juniper

hold the allure to this waking weather

folding back the bedsheets

souvent je n'ai rêvé

que de toi seule

 

 

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Epilogue To A Far Empty Sun or

Eclipse of The Hunger Moon

Out of the eye of thoughtful waking

The open vacuum isn’t erected

A random set of tiny lizards

Surpass one another

Opaque kiwi realities

Of hems, not upscale jewels

“There I am!”

Both London and Callimachus

Can’t erase anything worse

This lack of acorns, empty worlds, gin

Drops the cracking of this sleeping absence

Unfolding forth the rickety chair’s drop cloth

My aunt reveals her self

An off key person cackling like you

 

 

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The Divas of Akroitiri

there's a risk of good will

which is vulgar

and which does not allow

my tastes to interfere

with the accident of beauty

forthwith the rise

of bread baked during winter

a range of savory

peanut snacks a sheep's sorrel

even in some cases

a bird bath or a sousaphone

in one's own home

 

 

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The Divas of Akron, Ohio

bad indecisiveness isn’t dangerous

but it’s quite elite

& lets you

be a butninsky

about the definiteness of ugliness

whatever the downfall

of a casserole of bullfrog

a firing range of sweets

rice cakes - the lamb’s a wolf

no, that’s never true

a therein to bathe by

a pigeon pie in every oven

 

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Locus Pocus

look at painting

as you would in a mirror

growing backwards

giving an eye for an ear

repudiated goddess

omniscient massage librarian

anyone can become autonomic

and ne’re a thought more

daresay every intention

by which splendor arrives

petitioning the sun

west of the Himalayas

for whom yellow is blue

 

 

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The Magic of the Monkey Bars

don’t look at a black hole

as I wouldn’t a stuffed room

shrinking toward you

withholding nonsense for gibberish

loved she-devil

ignorant crumpled book-hater

no one can not be enslaved

always goofing like a dickhead

I won’t say a single extension

without which squalor never comes

& the moon never knows

east of the feminist stand-ups

for whom purple is orange

 

 

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Circe’s Lament

all the words are taken

I've made sure of that

burying them under stumped trees

whatever else you can't find can

be found inside a glass

jar of pickled meat

plotted by a universe

whose hands call forth

verso after verso the milky lights

o ereshkigal of irkalla, eldest sister

of ishtar, queen mama of

nungal's half-siblings,

namtar and ninazu,

what music do you desire?

are humans a species worth living?

please whisper in fatalistic french

so I’ll know which animal

will befit their fate

 

 

---

Eric’s Joy

none of the unsaid is given

you’ve not known its

unearthing above gnarly roots

nothing you lose can’t

be lost again outside a whiper-ish

strewn tidbit of rotting vegetable

untapped map of a black hole

those silent feet go backwards

recto a.d. recto the slimy darkness

as if that guy koresh were from iraq, youngest

brother of the rat king, dad of

lagnun’s 2^nd cousins once removed

moon rat and another nin

what chance atonality don’t I hate?

aren’t zombies to be annihilated?

do shout out in random syllables

so the not-I won’t know all the rocks

are wrong for any beginning

 

 

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Ode to Neap Tide

suffered from shipwreck fever

&/or the plurality of worlds

everything is to anyone

an agent to dispose of

aboard the man o’ war

neither rejoicing isles

of palm & myrrh

nor carried by sail & oar

but as profile in a flat vortex

when the sun and moon

are at right angles fleshy

edible white and yellow

their carved faces make

lanterns for the damned

who return to Bagdad

 

 

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I Hate the Tides

took pleasure from docking pitch

& the singleness of utopia

nothing ain’t to no one

an unconcerned citizen

who’s joined Grannies-for-Peace

to separate both peninsulas

unbalanced by nonviolent protest

but as hazy view in a squiggly maelstrom

when the darkness & night sweats

aren’t anywhere near each other

their mushy about-faces tear apart

more darkness for the blessed

sent forth to make an easter island peace