Out of the
murky docks
a wily dying shadow
howls
tangled in black
and aching for
swift currents and
the voice of a woman
Hurriedly, she beckons
as her toes
tickle shells
and moss anew
Love me on the sand
our whispering cove
will be within
the waves
With a rose
a breath, a coin
the tide in her
hair is born
she submerges her
listening ears
wisely resisting the
moon's magnetism
The sea courts her
with a fervor both
terrifying
and honorable
spreading his crackling
wealth on the shore
offering opalescent
shells in the pink dawn
Her jellyfish heart
pulses flourescent
and in its omnipresent
blindness
wishes only
to marry
the staggering
stars
11 November 2009
A Brilliant Contusion
I am bruised, swerving
though my feet are planted
I am anointed with the
fragrant future
I press it to my temples
to my wrists where the
molasses moves along
We debate our way through
the headiest of conflicts
the wordiest hypotheses, but
in the blue-black cold, our
sweet lips lose their honey
and all articulation
A product or consequence
I speculate
of this crushing solitude
Aching lonely bones in a city
a crowded dance hall
a dust-cluttered closet
I swallow this hope whole
Its impossibility is unbearable
weighty, leaden, even, and
from where I sit
there is no dawn approaching
On this frostbitten night my
extremities are creaking, and
my heart
my heart
27 October 2009
though my feet are planted
I am anointed with the
fragrant future
I press it to my temples
to my wrists where the
molasses moves along
We debate our way through
the headiest of conflicts
the wordiest hypotheses, but
in the blue-black cold, our
sweet lips lose their honey
and all articulation
A product or consequence
I speculate
of this crushing solitude
Aching lonely bones in a city
a crowded dance hall
a dust-cluttered closet
I swallow this hope whole
Its impossibility is unbearable
weighty, leaden, even, and
from where I sit
there is no dawn approaching
On this frostbitten night my
extremities are creaking, and
my heart
my heart
27 October 2009
Ouroboros
Hold fast to mischief, you
sun-tousled child, brother
to anonymity and to knowledge
Take this as if you weren't
taking anything at all
You were grandfathered into
this scheme, your hope is
certainly not your own
Whatever comes
what never knows
frowns are extraneous
We narrate ceaselessly
conjoined at the larynx
This makes you feverish
Editorial jurisdiction cloaked in
bananaficarious trumpery unhinged
kneaded in domes hollow like icy
pipes in the crowded cold halls of
institutional, pubescent pondering
Heiress in chains
see all with a kiss
civil eyes
can find nothing amiss
Forego your due process
be not miserly or timid
proudly gouge the ribbed
mechanism that constrains you
Like a stained shoe
strained through
the one who claims you
never knew who named you
You with exhaled love
waver like red rubber
in a medicated wind
screwed into your
ancestral socket and
resign your thoughts
painfully
to the gradient darkness
Stuart S. and Whitney Testa
12 October 2009
(Stu and I used a very dysfunctional typewriter to collaborate on the preceding work. I will upload an image of the original in time, the retrograde implications of crooked Courier typeface do much for the art of it all.)
sun-tousled child, brother
to anonymity and to knowledge
Take this as if you weren't
taking anything at all
You were grandfathered into
this scheme, your hope is
certainly not your own
Whatever comes
what never knows
frowns are extraneous
We narrate ceaselessly
conjoined at the larynx
This makes you feverish
Editorial jurisdiction cloaked in
bananaficarious trumpery unhinged
kneaded in domes hollow like icy
pipes in the crowded cold halls of
institutional, pubescent pondering
Heiress in chains
see all with a kiss
civil eyes
can find nothing amiss
Forego your due process
be not miserly or timid
proudly gouge the ribbed
mechanism that constrains you
Like a stained shoe
strained through
the one who claims you
never knew who named you
You with exhaled love
waver like red rubber
in a medicated wind
screwed into your
ancestral socket and
resign your thoughts
painfully
to the gradient darkness
Stuart S. and Whitney Testa
12 October 2009
(Stu and I used a very dysfunctional typewriter to collaborate on the preceding work. I will upload an image of the original in time, the retrograde implications of crooked Courier typeface do much for the art of it all.)
Everything Was Right
Tresses anchor raven shadows
the season waltzes like a wildfire
the line, lyric and musty
rouses a harsh thrill
We lay our hands on wood
crudely leaving our mark there
Bark is our skin and our
fecund flesh is ripe
The sap on your tongue is
grainy, bitter, deadly adhesive
You are dilapidated like me
living on rice and greens like me
Each red leaf in the runoff
is rusty like me
pulling its weight like me
chlorophyll born and dying like me
For three days we arranged
slumbering smooth dominoes
and their graceful clattering was
most natural
14 October 2009
the season waltzes like a wildfire
the line, lyric and musty
rouses a harsh thrill
We lay our hands on wood
crudely leaving our mark there
Bark is our skin and our
fecund flesh is ripe
The sap on your tongue is
grainy, bitter, deadly adhesive
You are dilapidated like me
living on rice and greens like me
Each red leaf in the runoff
is rusty like me
pulling its weight like me
chlorophyll born and dying like me
For three days we arranged
slumbering smooth dominoes
and their graceful clattering was
most natural
14 October 2009
Downward
My lady folded her
foolish feathers as
the grapefruit sun
lay camp on the
shore of a light
blue sea and
though her heart
fails her while
waking, in
slumber
she plods
along
a
silent
prisoner
10 October 2009
foolish feathers as
the grapefruit sun
lay camp on the
shore of a light
blue sea and
though her heart
fails her while
waking, in
slumber
she plods
along
a
silent
prisoner
10 October 2009
Dahlia, Darling
Here where plastic peels, we fade in the altitude,
The leather couch sliding across the wooden floor,
The fire blue with love. I round the bend,
A rocking groove serenades my sallow heart.
Here, I live the entirety of my abundant life.
Here, I am wealthy, though dressed in synthetic rags.
An aluminum awning protects you from
A soulless street where curtains burn,
Where the patio is icy perilous and
One quadrant is strictly forbidden.
I am liquid, golden, warm,
Spun silly by rapturous luck.
You cupped my shoulder blades and
Your lips tasted of wine and soot.
You cannot give confession, and instead
Drip wax on the cold, wiry carpet,
Orchestrate earth-shattering discord.
I must call one chamber of this fading heart ours,
Though we are children.
Here we howl, alight at the first slow beat.
Here we rest, splintered at longest last.
9 November 2009
The leather couch sliding across the wooden floor,
The fire blue with love. I round the bend,
A rocking groove serenades my sallow heart.
Here, I live the entirety of my abundant life.
Here, I am wealthy, though dressed in synthetic rags.
An aluminum awning protects you from
A soulless street where curtains burn,
Where the patio is icy perilous and
One quadrant is strictly forbidden.
I am liquid, golden, warm,
Spun silly by rapturous luck.
You cupped my shoulder blades and
Your lips tasted of wine and soot.
You cannot give confession, and instead
Drip wax on the cold, wiry carpet,
Orchestrate earth-shattering discord.
I must call one chamber of this fading heart ours,
Though we are children.
Here we howl, alight at the first slow beat.
Here we rest, splintered at longest last.
9 November 2009
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