lxxxiii

from hill-top to hill-top
calling,

echoing over the valley,

someday, someone will build
a city,

on the thin waves
of hunger, recognized

recognition, returned,
not yet,

redoubled, someday, the
net of desire, calling

desire--re-oriented and
re-ordered, redoubled will

rise--and reach, as it is
falling to the ears,
of us

below--will build a city of
desire broken upon

answering desire broken,
and redoubled,

and rising, the shuddering
remnants rising, sundered

reaching, such

a city built upon the empty remnants
of desire will sear the sky

irresistible, unanswerable--always
answering, unanswering, too fast

to fall, always falling--fragments
rising to fill the sky, breaking


rising to unbreakable, will
criss-cross to the sky

lxxviii.

in the shadows beneath the ring-road
he says: "we could pray together."

I say no: and I walk on--the people on
the verge watch the old man

twitch, he's foaming blood and spit
from his mouth, and I yell up at them,
garbled:

"Has anyone called the doctor, why don't
you help me?"

"What can we do?"

I kneel on the cobbled towpath, and I tell
him that it's alright, that someone is here
that help is coming

(is it?)

two policemen come, and a pharmacist,
they look over the wall, baffled:

"What is the shortest way down?"

(down the slope, through the dead grass)

"Go right, and come down the stairs."

(come down the slope)

when the younger man comes along, fat
with success, I say:

"You help me. Can you help me?"

"I speak English. I am a Christian."

Then: Christian, loosen his belt, and
check to see if he is taking any medications,

"Is anyone coming?"

"Two police and pharmacist, they are coming
from the right..."

"The shortest way is left..."

(Yes. I know that, when I think about it, but
what can you do?)

"Loosen his belt, ask him if he is taking any medications
we must--raise his head so he doesn't choke...

...he may have broken his neck, he fell down the verge,
there's blood on the edge of wall. Careful."

the people lean over the wall, watching, I say: "Listen:
I'm here, someone is here, help is coming...

...wait, wait just a little, wait and live, wait
and I am here

someone is here, so wait a little, just
a little longer, wait."

he says, "maybe we should pray."

the old man gurgles, chokes,
drools, twitching

"No."

"But, maybe we should pray."

"No. He probably isn't a Christian, don't pray over him
for a god that isn't his, we should just be here.

the wind whisks chill, over the stones.

Let him know that someone's here."

I put my hand next to the old man's, flat on the cobbles, who
knows if he wants to touch me--he might not,

it must be strange, to be stuck herewith me crouching over him

feet pounding on the cobbles, two policemen gasping, a
pharmacist rushing,

(there's no emergency services here, there's whoever you
can get from the shop, from the street)

hands waving, I rise, and start walking,

(I don't want trouble--I don't stay
for questions)

I rise, and start walking, under the overpass,

the young man rushes after me,

"...maybe we should pray?"

"Hope for the best--we've done what we can. Why pray."

"It might make us feel better."

"We've done what we can, why pray now? There's nothing
more to be done, so why pray?"

--the sun hits bright, past the shadows under the bridge, I
don't look back,

I rise onto the street

lxxxvi.

I have met you, and I have met you
over the long-haul of the years

when the shadows grew long across the carpet
the night, swirling, singing through the window

whispered in the darkness, between the beds, the
distance is immeasurable, is small

when the kitchen light burns against the silent, rustling
night, the sage brushing under the street lamps

the meat sizzles in the pan, these words cannot be repeated
the windows are thick, the glow from the television

some other world, the strength of the door, is a thing
we believe in, the hallway, well-lit

the linoleum is old, the ocean coos across the plaza,
I held your hand, I think, after we left the auditorium

somewhere in a dark apartment, with the street rushing
outside--I have met you, and met you,

this sort of talk: it was no lie, I remember, I remember
the books stacked on the desk, the eddying

rush of aspiration: other places, the street corner, under
the light from the windows, the porch with the smoke

rising high, other places: under the eucalyptus and jacaranda,
the benches outside the grocery, the strange gap

in the wall, with forest seeping in, I remember the chatter,
I have met you--I have met you,

other places: I cannot imagine

the world eddies, it breaks--shard-like--this sort
of talk: it isn't for nothing

lxxxv.

or it chases me harries me across the plains

breaks the sky over my head,

washes out the road, drives me to the hallway

to the safe-room in the gas station

(the world flung upon itself, rises

shrieking and blowing--the radio says

that's about right, for this time of year)

drops a year's worth of water on the hallway between rooms,

lightning cracks above the railing--

the endless rolling plains, sheeting rains, clouds cluster

along the peaks, the freeway awash up to the pass

(fifteen minutes behind, the shack fragile among the green

hillsides--the coffee is free, she gives it to me because I was

am a student--the radio buzzes behind the counter, but she

doesn't know, and I don't, if we're outside the path)

the city is dark, and there is not rest, and no place to

stop--running, and my head is buzzing, is burning

is breaking, past the turn-off--I remember, I nearly slept

and did not sleep there--the last time

(the trucks huddle under the neon, resting, waiting, I

see one on the road, and it is shuddering)

no place is safe and there is nothing free or fine

about the road, heat burning--I am burning

(this is detail work, this is minute adjustment as the winds

blow the wheels--slightly--

off course, this is timing the seconds between headlights

in the wash between the lines, this is the wiper hum and the dance

between this stroke and that, this buffet and that one, the wavering

wheels before me, in convoy)

wavering on the grass--

(the clouds rise and hang over the mountains, the wash is wide

to the feet of the hills--the sage flat, the sky cracks--columns of light

falling to the desert below--this is a hundred miles from anywhere,

I open the window

           and the wind shakes my car off course, towards the ditch)

I am falling, not rising--flattened by the heat and the wrongness

--because it is wrong, all of it is wrong--and there is nothing here

to see, nothing that can help

(the ditches, they say, if it comes upon you--get down in the ditches,

it'll lift your car up and bring it down, break you in it--get out and get down

and get down into the ditches, if it comes upon you

the sirens blow--

and I blow through, before them)

the streets are empty and dark, but the lights are bright--I step down from the

seat, you know this is a nice part of town, and break towards the bushes

the cars rush through the parkway below the trees, and gimlet,

in the spreading orange light, I pass slowly up the street

           and the mesas rise, and the pines waver--hold steady against the rough

green peaks, where the mesas meet the pine--they rise green and gold, riddled

with layers--greenery falling through their chasms,

a peach stand at the base of the cliffs

the lakes deep and blue, the slope roofed villages--and the curving mountain road

with slopes rising steep next to it, and the wildflowers--

by the rest stop--narrow, but smooth--and the broken pavement, the trailers

            huddled where one silent freeway meets another, the souls stalking

the asphalt before the desert, who stays here?--oh, all sorts of people--the

people who are walking cross-country, the people who are biking

cross-county, they come here for reunions--I stop as the first range rises, and

give half a chocolate bar to two Irish cyclists, resting

in the view area--the light gilds the rolling ridges, purple, gold and green--lit

from within, maybe, and the valley blazing as the sun sets,

          back that way, there is no way to compass this immensity, it is beyond

me, behind--back that way, there are worlds upon worlds,

the city rises in haze, the morning heavy and hot--and I have nothing, but I

make something to suit, it is frayed and fading

by noon--I will be gone before night falls again

lxxxiv.

thunder rolls in from the east,
--shatters the night, the sage blows

down, across the slope, too late
it's too late--for most,

the stars fly and spin overhead,
I will find--voices I can barely hear

echo up from the avenue,
to the corner of the room

wheels scrape on the pavement,

the light shifts and blurs, falls gentle
on wood, dust rising above

the faded carpet--mildew leaking from
the walls--hung somewhere

I don't remember, or possibly folded now

(we sacrifice these details when we burn the past,
break it's spine on every second passing)

 the first person I ever trusted said to chase the spring

so I chase it. 

lxxviii.

with kindness--the gravel creaks
the gate sharp,

the night is coming soft,
--too slow

lxxvi.

I watch the pines, but they do not answer

I swear the night is smooth, like butter

they stand above me, full but not solemn
wavering gently, the stars glittering behind them

it will be a long time before I find a night as peaceful as this

whatever god watches over wandering scholars, watch over me

lxxv

love is neither owning nor belonging
who holds space in himself for the existence of another
finds a room for himself, held within another
loves, is loved

lxxxiv.

the birch haloed by the late light
twists and bows,

I will kneel, for a moment

the carpet beckons, so does
the early August night

somewhere far from here, where
the wind blows

sweet, waves the grass, and still
pass it, moving--listen:

rushing in a some kind
of dread line

nothing waits, not for you not
for me, nothing waits--past

the grass, nothing is still, it
moves, regardless,

beyond the night falling, rushing
going down, nothing--nothing

still, you might move too
to see it, regardless

lxxxiii.

a brief glow, the dark becomes dark,
I cannot see--the whole cannot

be recounted, in reflection, there
is too much, the staircase slants

cuts, not twists

at the bottom--who knows? no,
shadow, certain--who can remember:

wet-wood morning, damp mulch, the
moon, high and tight, the hills rise,

they slope, the avenues of trees, impenetrable,
the shuddering emptiness, of the desert--

the light cast over the asphalt, and the lamp
in the window, the third-floor office, who knows--

the boulevard grinding, the sun sunders the dusk
from the day--the sun falls into the cleft, at the

intersection, the crowd falls away, in the hallway,
who can say--the lights hang from the eaves, smoke

rises up into the balcony, on the lee-side the couch
is willing to welcome, the night shivers ice and the

space heater groans, the afternoon sun filters through
the basil, through sparse of roof of leaves over

the bench, the stress unfold endless, and woodsmoke,
sage, rosemary in the morning--the leaves like stars

in the puddles, when it flooded, the sage waves in
the wind, the golden hour and blue dawn, and the

eucalyptus whispers, it doesn't keep its promises--
and who can say, but I think, the storm pipe in

the morning, and the night spiraling into burnt
remnants, and manzanita, and the king oak,

the house falling into the swamp, and the dream
I had, where I walked up to the pepper tree

at the bend, branches hanging low, over the curve,
and the crest, before the sun fell below the trees,

it bathed everything it color, and the moon full
and huge, and low, over the bamboo, over the canal

through the rounded entrance below the foot-bridge,
the chill air, and the scent of garlic, the strange

shivering water below the pier, and in the second story
above the tables, and in the empty, and in the park space

behind the shopping center, where the trees hung wide,
branches low, the plaza before it and the entrance,

and the memory of bamboo, whispering, I think, and
I think it's true that: the time when all stories

could be told at one time, the ice on the plains, and the
bridges frozen, over the delta, the yellow-green northern

fields, and snow piled to the windows, the black branch
against the grimy cinder-block walls, smoke and foreign

words, twice over, and once again--the plants on the sill,
the door hung open, the porch as the light came running

down the ridges, the loping canyons, the oven warm--
it scents the room, the room like a coffin, like a den, like

a closet, like a cell--like a cave, the road along the coast,
the sea of lights, moving, shot through the valley--the,

and I think, it is true, it is certain--bricked in buildings,
and light hanging low in the dogwoods, the unbearable heat

it is true--that the time when all stories were one, could be
told at one time--the age of viable explanation,

that time is over, all stories were one, but that--
--it's alright, that time is over, it's alright.

tent

trace the stars,
with your finger--it is true,
the only writing that means

anything--is buried in the bone
your finger, trace the stars,

limn the constellations, raise the
rafters, thrust the patterns

rubbish, dross and other miscellany
above our heads, the linework

folly, the thin web of recollection
imperfect, whisking in the wind,

tracing the hilltops, breaking them
into segments--it makes them better,

canvas and memory, hang the lights,
or better--make the heavens your lantern,

the moon in the gaps left by experience,

--standing in the center of asphalt circle,
legs like poles--darts between them,

fingers against the sky: flaps and side, the
rope of half-read stories

swaying between them, the wind lights,
goes--this shelter without walls,

tensile, the intangible ceiling--throw the slanting
tipping, spinning, whole of it against the sky,

half-wise, half-built--better written
in fragments, unexpected--it is new

it's old--but the trace rises and weaves
eclectic accretion--becomes whole

and part, frames the sky

lxxxii.

even if
the blue morning

fades, the drooping leaves
hold little,

the night promises the return
of the silence

of dawn, I saw trees break today
into pieces, I am glad,

but light pooling between the curbs
holds, the words

spoken at night, pool
whenever dawn is blue there,

lxxxi.

the Old Gods are dying,
--aren't they always?

those stories kindle, the wind
falls between the walls--

--and who knows what lies beyond
them, shadowed and rustling,

in the burning night, by the fire
it's flailing phantoms,

the note--is this:

whisper and it kindles,

---

sure as shadow--the falling dark
your reference

will live as many lifetimes, as
are necessary,

---

surely: the indelible imprint
remains--

beyond feeling, the touchstone
the remnant of

who knows what?--it remains
through fear, past it

the rest fails, who knows why?--
this empty thing

rebuilds it.

lxxx.

what is sacred--is held
covered,

inflection unveils

(affection cannot)

attention, the details:
bear inestimable

heroism, shattered
reflect

light unrelentingly,
unbroken, carry

such reflection forward.

lxxix.

the section, runs
fingers--the text,

in texts, transliteration
half-garbled the world runs

on broken translation,
into
haphazard meaning--

the figures, hung together,
run into definition

contra hope, run
counter ambition, against
meaning

haze before the window,

this poor constellation of letters
and lines, this shuddering

collection of half-remembered
insights,

aggregated but not understood--
run against time, these poor fools

these days will be mis-remembered

lxxviii. (the texas rise)

the extension of shrub to scrub
to stream, and the willow drooping over them,

burning, the air thick, and unyielding
the light, unforgiving--swallows shadow

the leaves sway, and stream-bed sucks
effluent and overflow, the shadows fall

benediction, only in the cleft, between
properties--the long avenue, the burning

lawns--the endless street from plain to
plain, to fence, to copse, to plain

to school, to step--to walls and windows,
the heat claims everything, even its absence

the horizon wavers, offers more plain and more, but
absorbed, digested--the heat suffuses, all things

makes all things, itself

all futures, teaches this: the outstretched hand, the
steady step, when the world is burning

is the measure of anything that matters, it could
all blur, it could all fade, swirl--compress

down, this one point, moving--measures
the rest, never so grand, never so broad, never so wide
the world might swirl, fall into one place and consume
lawns and gates and plains together,

in movement, desire broken
free of its delineation, the sun will fade
before memory, the heat rise and break
on the quiet axe of unmet need

remade, exiled--sundered on the cleft
of a different place, and its attendant worlds
and wants

lxxvii.

the heat hazes, the dust on the windshield,
the figures blur, sometimes--

the figuration of lights, at no interval
heuristic unto the moment,

the cars flock, they flow, they brake,
at the line--the light burns

sense, from the pattern--these things
hold sense:

the flat of the sole on the ground
the shadow, aslant, step and stride
the fingers, clutch and fall,
the eyes to blur and clear

these things do not hold sense:
the glow upon the grass, the
stars rise, the lights hang, and fall
across the glass--these things do not
hold sense:

the cricket's beat, the sun's blaze cut
the whispering in the weeds, the morning's
pale blue light, the night's indigo glory

these things do not hold sense:
the murmured conversation, the broken
syllables, the reeds which catch them, ditches
damp, in the evening, the moment in the lee of
the light, under the eaves, the clouds of smoke--
the words fall, they fail, these things hold sense:

the burn in your calves, the fingers aching,
clenching--these things hold sense: the lingering
sense of direction, the fading guidepost of
memory, the aching shape of what is
missing--these things hold no sense:

sleep: the quite, unbroken silence, of the dark--the
strange anticipation (crickets blare) of early dawn,
the wheel-wells rumble, up a familiar cliff, the mountain
dry and gleaming, the raven's call, the gloaming
rising tide of hope, the benches worn, sea-beaten grain,
the easy availability of vision, over the walls, toward the
sea, the comfortable space, reserved and waiting, so easy
to slip into--these things hold no sense,

the sense of waiting, of being waited on, but these things
hold sense: the glimmer, and the haze that rose from these
things, and the sense of waiting, the desperate, burning
searching--we will burn ourselves to remember the night

lxxvi.

in one march, a long time ago
the table was long,

and the breeze whispered through
a crack in the window

I sweat, and I saw through the long
hallway, a hand

over the ocean, long and nimble
so--the fate and failure of reach

long and nimble, and all the halls
were windows, and the windows
were halls, and I wept

for every light in the sky, and its
mad flung capacity,

ranging, but we choke, we fall
along the border, still--

the heat, lay across the table like
a person, in the bottom of the cup

the leaves say this:

one moment of wrongness is enough
to bring the mountain to the sea, but not enough
to bring hand to hand,

it will burn, the fall


---

not enough to bring life to the day, nor the days
thereafter, only in these

similar moments of madness, enough to bring
the hand to the mind, never mind it, but enough
to bring the hand to the mind, regardless--

no account that, nevertheless, enough, but only
in these similar moments of madness

not enough, but when madness falls to
subjunctive madness--then

lxxv.

the dry air will choke out
the most reasonable

of delusions, the lights
flicker upon a thousand histories

slouched against the vinyl, legs
stretched out,

constrained by art, slumped
over the tufted plastic,

molded particle-board,

--time will make virtue of
any misstep that lasts, any
precept that travels as far
as the fingers--

--someone will say, I
used to think like that,

the wings shake, maybe the sky
alleviates itself of such a
limited definition,

sends you stumbling, into halls
made by human hands, sure, as a
finger in your eye, reminding you,

that art is so much, slam yourself
against the window,

such the power of that art, that the world itself
is made of windows, and I would
bleed on them, broken--but that is such a
sliver of nothing.

---

it could be a kind of birth, but the moment
drags, against the air--

until it is all but dead, and
releases, then

lxxiv.

if it spins wild, mad
and turns,

                if you turn,
your face--from the

from mine, the lights
high upon

the balcony, the whirl
of feet, in the circle

will tell you, if
corners become
        impossible

rooms where the smoke
curls high, the word drifts
down,

if you carry a knife, sunk
among the scraps, I

gather them from around
the blade--the world might
wait awhile

for us, caught in the branches
of dogwood, hanging low over
the street
                hung from this moment

or the next,

for now, if it spins, I will see you
in the black, frames the sky,

imagine, in the girders, below
the drape--just beyond the edge

of sight, this breath and the next,
for a moment--world enough

it might wait, never expected
nevertheless

lxxiii.

if consigned to memory
                       recursion

I lay these words,
as carefully as I once
laid my days--

you became symbol

when the boughs were falling
flying in the street,

fallen across the lanes, green
and broken, the towers blowing,

green, over the hillside,

lxxii.

it fell off of my desk,

the broken stems,
the dirt on the carpet
the sharp scent of greenery

--I smell it from the doorway

---

the frame creaks against the sill,
the imprint of the wind

falls along the sides of this building
whips into the circle,
it rises, rushing and empty
up the verge

through the dark in the needles,
cut by the gate