zinc words & images

  • Cracking

    Feeble mauve against the sky. Are we carrion, blistered and bleached? Craters ablast shale flayed from mountains and piled against the moon’s reflection. We were not here among the sheaves of paper, the mounded dirt. I think this, the wretched beginning, was when I could see sand, a mote impaling the air. Dissipation, chemical disposal…

  • Untitled

    Salt, When the tide comes in. My eyes are clear And the grains of sand are mirrors Reflecting one another For miles. Beyond the horizon I know nothing waits And only becomes. Piers Stand crumbling, Tickmarks that circle the shore. I can count the number of times I’ve been here. My hands, my words, Adding…

  • Who walks

    The pain you feel is natural. It reminds you of the asparagus tips You moved from one side of your plate to another. When you wished You were somewhere else Anywhere else. But really That was the problem. Sight. The invisibility. You Are never alone but A room of lamps and chats Reminds you of…

  • Scenic

    The shape of your waist is a bolt of red satin wrapped around a spool. The woven ripple makes waterfalls and valleys, lines and angles. I can see you, a pillar, red, against the sky, against mother earth and father city.

  • Turning

    If we take candor at its word, We can see though To night. I could let you lay Still       but waiting Holds no promise Of visibility. Better to Tousle your hair and pull At your shoulder than Imagine the morning And its light of absence.

  • Evening snow

    Snow crisped the leaves That had settled Near my doorway.   My eyes met the oak tree’s As it stood guard against the wind.   Through the window, I could see this and the Remaining Christmas trees, On the neighborhood curbs.   When the evening dims, The windows across from me Become the artificial fire…

  • Feast

    A crisp edge on my plate At Le Quartier. I’m Reminded of the Saline oysters which Hemingway consumed And then described. Perhaps It is less the food than A feeling of timeless Observance. A table, A chair, sustenance and Pleasure. If the day is Cloudless, fine, but with A few clouds all the Better. In…

  • Twilight Dream

    Braided crown, glowing flesh, certainly unreal against the street’s opulence laid down by the rain and now catching the light like pearls strewn across the floor. Your voice, laid against mine, bore through the molecules between us. A path through time, flooding with desire, magic words that bind us in front of this 19th Street…

  • Flora

    Some say opening, blooming, But each petal unwinds Itself across the air, Denying gravity’s hands And existing only for itself And its encircled sisters.

  • Music-maker

    I can’t stop singing. Every name I’ve known, on a note, ringing. I smile, open my throat. Sounds, a glorious treaty between myself and my past. I catch the A# and pull it back, my first death and I make it last. How is it that my heart is my mouth? I know your breath…