It underwrites all our blessings, note for note, on its way up into the
rafters
I don’t have to explain
Hand after
hand
I don’t have to be embarrassed
*
The black branches of the oaks glide above us like the shadows of koi
Disappearing
beneath leaves
and mud
What does God promise?
It’s winter, so
the orange and red bellies of the fish
look like small fires
Soon everything will ice over
There won’t be
any room, not
anymore
Little Prayer
The swing sets
covered in ice
are perfect statues
of moonlight
Buckets of snow
You can stand here all morning in darkness if you want to
There are monsters
hiding
all over the neighborhood
Maybe you are one
*
The snow comes down in feathered clumps, like someone pulling out
their hair
Quietly
The street
The parked cars
The elms
Listen
don’t let any of my dead friends come back
There they are
Walking up the street
dragged up the street
by their hair
by you
*
You think it’s going to hurt, and it does, only not in the way that you
imagined
Her hand there and then
not there
His
hand there
and then not
there
My little prayer:
Take
Take
Take
Me in a snow-white T-shirt and blue jeans
and you
in your
Heavy Crown
My Father Full of Light
Tonight the moths are beating the shit out of themselves against the
screen door
It looks like smoke
So does the light
inside his rings, his
wristwatch
The blood swimming around inside his face
in lightning blotches beneath his skin
like the residue of beets
on a cutting board
also
emitted light
A blizzard of wings
*
He thinks God
is going to clean
everything up
Hands made from Light and Feathers, moving us around, dusting us off
Everything
settling back into the warm
colors of autumn
instead of getting
ground down
into glass
which, I get the feeling
diamond after
diamond
is what’s really
going to happen
*
I could have
whatever I wanted
once a year
Whatever you want
it’s on me
Coconut cream pies rotated slowly behind bright windows like the cities of heaven
The register sang
Flies collected
on our water glasses
My father, for a moment, was full of light
Men came and went
I knew
our waiter was the son
of someone
Late Meditation
What are you going to do?
Describe the light
falling
through the pitch pines
again?
lit it on fire
Their eyelids
and toe-
nails
That was one day
The snow geese migrating above us in the dark was another
Wheeling
The light
is red
and
inextinguishable
*
Do you think His arms
are going to make
a cradle
for your head
so you can finally
fall asleep?
The yellow crocus just outside the front door is not a miracle of light
But pretty close
in its papery
stillness
The only color in the entire yard
We are trying
very hard
to be alone
*
One way
is to sit very still
and count
your breath
Another way
is to stare out the window
until your mind
disappears
The smell of the pine needles smoldering in the woods behind the
lake is enough to return
your mind
Needle by
needle
The doors were locked
from inside
Into the Earth
The best time was the first time, on the floor of her living room
people walking past the apartment outside
talking loudly
Almost naked
on the carpet
Finally!
If you take me
into the bedroom
you know
you could fuck me
Streetlight beginning to pile up outside her windows, along the
couch, pooling into her
sunken hips
White
Cathedrals
*
Your face is like everyone’s
face underground
Tunneled
Pretty acre
after pretty acre
You aren’t even here so I don’t know why I’m telling you this except
I’m telling myself
over and over again
by myself
You are not listening
with pity
*
The photos I took of the tide pools get close to the sand, the wind
my hangover
this morning
climbing over the rocks
They get close
but just fall short
They are a nice description of something beautiful that doesn’t exist
anymore
No one I loved had died for almost two years
Then Amy bled out
in a bathtub
Good Friday
I think the light
appearing, then
disappearing
across the trunk of the live oak
is the boss of everything
Not You
Not Your hands tearing up the grass in the neighbor’s yard, fashioning
little green crosses
no one can fit on
We can put them to our lips though
and whistle
*
I don’t see You everywhere
all night, and
I have all night
Fire ants walking the edge of a blade of grass in the moonlight
We’ll want to keep our mouths
away from that one
A parade
all night, and I have
all night
Cords of wood stacked all over the neighborhood
Snakes asleep beneath the kindling
Stars—
Return, don’t
return
*
The dogs bark
at my house
Why is that?
If You came back and it happened again
we w
ould shave Your head
and attach black wires
to Your solar system
We would turn the dial
You would see Your mother
Your childhood
and small pockets
of darkness behind
Your eyes
turn to lightning
Someone would wipe You clean with a towel
Someone
would put You
in the ground
My Dead Friends Come Back
If you want to
come back, just you
I say it’s fine
From the flattened universe
From His side
of the bed
Shave my head and put me in the ground with you surrounded by
trillium
Trillium or
something else
Shit and violets
*
If you want to
come back, just you
I say it’s fine
From endless singing
From the icy branches
of evergreens
I want to trade you sunlight for starlight, or star for star, the night sky
disappearing for
coffee in the morning
What I want
I want to fuck you again
on the living-room
floor
*
If you want to
come back, just you
I say it’s fine
From your hijacked brain
From your skeleton
sparkling like change
on a countertop
Your life as light is just beginning in the cosmos, but you can come
back if you want to
What a terrible place this is
Limping around
not in each other’s arms
not like light
at all
Ode
When you cry like that you sound like meat being tenderized by
hand
Beaten, flipped and
beaten again
If I’m deathly quiet
it’s because I want to hear
the muscles flatten
The sun pours in from the other shore
and runs its fingertips
over the shank
Like a butcher in love!
Here—you can wipe
your hands
on my apron
*
It’s not heaven
it’s the early dark
Everything fighting
to be seen
Hands and
stars
Sometimes the bed seems to be made entirely of skin
Sheets of skin
Onion and Egyptian
my legs, your
stomach
Honey
I can’t stop grinning
I’m having so much fun
trying to relax
around your fist
*
It’s as if we’re both standing on the wilder shore of some immaculate
kitchen, our towels folded neatly, into bleached-
white columns
I love your spine, chef
Serrated
Butterfly
Bird’s Beak
I love
your technique
Lifting the veins up carefully in the early light and then putting them
back down again
Lifting them up
Putting them back
Lifting them up
*
Do you think there’s a difference
for the Lord
between
slow dancing in the kitchen at night, no music, your arms around my neck, and later
my face
in your ass?
I think His home is covered in dark leaves
cicada wings and
promises
a peaceful night
a perfect death
*
Are you hungry?
Do you want to get up?
Do you want some coffee?
I want to bow very low
all the way down to the ground
actually lie down
my face pressed hard
against the tiles
my arms out, and bow
to your fingers
your parents who put you here
your legs
the backs of your knees
your mouth
your chin
how you smell
how you smell at night
bow to your voice
across the kitchen
crooning
Come here
Come back
I’m going to bend you
over my knee
We Did Not Make Ourselves
We did not make ourselves is one thing
I keep singing into my hands
while falling
asleep
for just a second
before I have to get up and turn on all the lights in the house, one
after the other, like opening
an Advent calendar
My brain opening
the chemical miracles in my brain
switching on
I can hear
dogs barking
some trees
last stars
You think you’ll be missed
It won’t last long
I promise
*
I’m not dead but I am
standing very still
in the backyard
staring up at the maple
thirty years ago
a tiny kid waiting on the ground
alone in heaven
in the world
in white sneakers
I’m having a good time humming along to everything I can still
remember back there
How we’re born
Made to look up at everything we didn’t make
We didn’t
make grass, mosquitoes
or breast cancer
We didn’t make yellow jackets
or sunlight
either
*
I didn’t make my brain
but I’m helping
to finish it
Carefully stacking up everything I made next to everything I ruined
in broad daylight in bright
brainlight
This morning I killed a fly
and didn’t lie down
next to the body
as we’re supposed to
We’re supposed to
Soon I’m going to wake up
Dogs
Trees
Stars
There is only this world and this world
What a relief
created
over and over
Seeing Whales
You can go blind, waiting
Unbelievable quiet
except for their
soundings
Moving the sea around
Unbelievable quiet inside you, as they change
the face of water
The only other time I felt this still was watching Leif shoot up when
we were twelve
Sunlight all over his face
breaking
the surface of something
I couldn’t see
You can wait your
whole life
*
The Himalayas are on the move, appearing and disappearing in the
snow in the Himalayas