1.

turn tide
your parted lips
trees falling like the rain
turn your insides insides out
turn good weather bad

the star-burned gestures of our carelessness
when asked our diction is poor
our hearts like nailed chameleons
hang like jupiters over flowering moons

we wait for its return
its un-reluctant certainty
its minor inuction as it closes its eye
and finally sleeps brief instant

and every morning we will awake to its
long eclipse called day
and each day shall register our imprints
in the passing fantasies of clouds

2.

after the eclipse
while still all the people
were running for cover
while still after the red strollers
sweating mothers dragged
their pregnancies like carcasses
across the street
chained the family dog
to the bumpers of parked cards

to all the frightened harbor pilots
who watched the moon disappear
to all the brave little warriors
who took keen advantage of its darkness
to all the elderly but still upstanding citizens
of this fine nation
I have proposed moments of bestiality
followed by millions of remorse
I have advanced cloud-like formations
followed by days of dream-warmth

3.

so where
where are those rivers
that are giving all you people life
i guess i've lost my way

something's missing
stolen like the key to the cupboard
taken by wandering gypsies
put in their violins

i'm lost
the city spins bedspins
the people drink wine and 
pour the excess out upon the ground

the ground springs forth with 
fountains at them
and they like kids play
in the city fountains

4.

to the left the city walls are well guarded
and above the route the moon takes draws no resistance
and we
we keep ticking like falling bells
their calling
calling for resistance
the irreversible pull of gravity bears no resistance
and we,
falling,
resistance less
all falling into the earth
falling into the sun
falling into the stars left
by our limited imaginations

resistance less and therefore unbounded
our loves in the irreversible time of time
and falls of gravity
gravity falls and we follow oh so very
obediently chatting all the time

5.

and so turn tide
if parted lips
of flowers turned gold
of partings light as the dying of butterflies
ending here
alive again
sober and sane and
within arm's reach of reason sharp razor
and reason stands so so so uselessly by
to watch me caccoon in to
navigating the reasonless ends of all reason


1981, Boston Mass.                       next->