Words thrown about
Lost like skipping stones
I said
Love and cherish friendship and forever
Well I never well I never
Meant much at all
Except everything exceptional
Or all the words you never hear for all
The things you think you mean
Or how things aren't but ought to be

Gifted like a kiss from tidal lips
Over soft stones and moony hips
Laid dark on the wet sand
Her hair could be seaweed
Pushed pulled washed ashore
Left long and down on this beach

Limbs and roots from a seed
Birthing a nocturne tree
Sprung up and bathed to lie down in the dark.

Only love skips up
To cry
Or sooner dance around
In better light

When science sleeps in
Give fully and come as a friend would exhale
Asking of summer
Willed easy through that naked crib

New stories are lost within sight
Of the fading west
It will be a while
Before people talk

Standing in the desert
Remembering windshields
A white house and windmills
Pearls lose to dewdrops

In the dusk from the ruins
Retire the scholars' facts refuted

Beneath the sun's grimace

Fearful of such hush
Elders whisper
Recalling waterfalls
Proud nations
And snaky roads that choked green breath From growing grass

the general goings on of the sun-burnt neighborhood
the scorched-earth summerland fantasy

so many hoses on so many lawns
sprinkle suggestions that the world is leaking

huge asses wave and confirm with round authority
the existence of women out tending gardens

coaxing beauty from life shy to bud
coaxing color into roses

can they cure the bleach?
can the thirst be quenched?

even the grass can't grow in this
can't keep up with the mrs. joneses

in new york i got drunk to tell the truth and almost got locked up
when the beat ran with me and took a leak in a telephone booth

ee cummings on the (purest) paris lawn
presented as mr. americon

at two o'clock he got knocked out
pointing with the girl in the room over him
her boyfriend was still sober

at two PM i saw the blood of a poet
i saw the blood of a poet
run on the sidewalk
oh, the sidewalk-
it is without heart, i thought

so much i do not know

shadow things mirror memories

invented to drive me crazy

invented because maybe i'm crazy

i try not to hold them against her

false crimes transparent accusations

the past is there to trespass upon

my pen and flashlight cannot unfold that

the silent temple entrance

mythology i invent to exalt her

mythology i exalt to invent her

the faerie air around her head i breathe

the perfume of her mood i savor

i try not to weigh her down

not to look too hard into mysteries

just to dance around their edge is enough

enough to look away turn forward

to shine old lamps on new paths dark

on so much i do not know