my ruby eye
O you, who have suckled her bones
who have frowned at her horses
who have fingered her emerald
and now would taste her ruby too
and have i not enough exhaled
her undertowing rose at you
salt-sticky; here is sea-foam on skin
here are pregnant transparencies
and have i not already tossed
such tender and hard-bitten kisses
for sheath, another kris today
treasure accumulates like sand
behold an ever-angled wound
the spindle-pricked porosity of red
i am a self cutting gemstone
i bleed the emptiness of tools
i fling magenta words at birth
behold my prolonged scar of it
historical, faceting pre-wonder
tip that breaks her ice-pick tongue
she was a pirate and a fool
she ate the plexing devil fruit
vermillion stretching pelvic nerve
whose diadem lusts after you
and who is blinded by her kind
my fascination will glint cruel
sent basilisk or blushing bride
your fear will not take care of her
the heart, the fist, the appetite
when Cleopatra mounts insight
my empire burning leonine
by Mars, love’s favored principal
this reign of crimson tears divine
but sanguine as she’s gentle still
barefeet may meet the salad vine
and blue by babbled river’s chill
just so, what beggar wears my crown
is dying round the wheel again
out of her time, out of her mind
sweet dance, my dove perpetual
take this, the heartbeat of a sow
and let it flex upon your palm
it’s wet, the rumbling scarlet jet
now let her throb be thunder found
red wreath for convert cry, the end
how pilgrimage of period stain
i am in time, in time, will out
my ruby eye of her disposable throat
//
ποικιλόθρον’ ἀθανάτ’ Ἀφρόδιτα
& the probing path to yes
//
or not nothing
for saving the phenomena II
and more
//
//
the maskmaker’s wife (a prequel)
true, i killed a spider on thursday
it was counter-intentional, a blow
i cried for hours about it, hormonal
oceanic, and only later realized how
i was folding the hung-up laundry
i saw and tried to shake the hider out
from black denim, furry humble pro-leaper
but i miscalculated; too much snap
a streak of ichor mud across the web
between my right thumb and pointer finger
she unwound inches before she emptied
and died; i was so sad; i am so sorry
sorry, sorry, i spoke to her crumpled self
recriminations. what left—a legacy of masks
some translator inside a house of masks
and O how many masks there were for mercy
//
the time i was murdered by my own poetry, vol. x
slugs in the shower, laron tonight
fertile swarm; birth/life/death 2.5 hrs
box of tissues; hollywood tomorrow
//
crack of infinity
blue of a contusion, gold in scattered ribbons
feel something real that is not another
echo of myself
surprise is never really surprise
nothing arrives from nowhere
everything comes from some place
where my bridge
meets your jaw’s slope
lips soft between ridge
from the comfort in the many small
yet bright windows
the alternating colours of the terrace stars
we’re half-awake on this train
some of us going home
most hustling
we’re thin. and taut.
slender strings desperate to retain
all that is moving away
term of venery:
a ruckus of bros.
the garden as highway:
fox eyes, badger’s eyes
reflecting in the dark.
a raven with something red in its beak,
three running deer causing a fourth
it’s mostly just me
and you
and the season
but more exactly so
convergent infinity
//
This is hyperverse composed from hypertextual fragments of other bloggers' work; follow links to read complete pieces. — Praise belongs to all messengers of the heart.
//
just begonias, today //
and we’re hyperverse tomorrow;
know you my lyre, my love, my lunar
metronome displaying solar
]licks leaning lighter later
//
selamat tilem 🌑
the dancer
when kindness is as kindness shows
the son his mother’s body knows
my eyes are from another place
i smile at you to show my face
the lessons of an artist’s life
are gifts you rendered to his wife
he’s gentle as the fallen rain
what tokens we give back again
a sudden street, a stranger island
with traffic from a broken time
he’s holding her, she’s not alone
the dancer is already home
let’s draw again the graceful scene
in blouses pink, you met Christine
if recognition makes you laugh
he shows you with a photograph
a feeling hewing to the bone
her shapes are not unlike my own
she’s holding me, she’s not alone
the dancer is already home
what light there was is in your eyes
her singing voice was village wise
he looks for her before sun sets
and child again her own forgets
and he will press your softened hands
the gestured words, the closing fans
and holding you, you’re not alone
the dancer is already home
//
for Ibuk
//
selamat hari raya Galungan🌾
//
Socrates: turning aside there, let’s go along the Ilissus; and then we’ll sit down wherever it seems (doke-o) to be in a stillness (hesuchia).
// 229a
δεῦρ᾽ ἐκτραπόμενοι κατὰ τὸν Ἰλισὸν ἴωμεν, εἶτα ὅπου ἂν δόξῃ ἐν ἡσυχίᾳ καθιζησόμεθα
//
bone teacher
bone teacher, her equation is the cold
bone teacher, antarctic demon i am told
her negative degrees, your nose will surely freeze
and the leaves are shaking
inflection, her judgment is frozen central
inflection, her cold bottom is biblical
winter is a time, winter makes you rhyme
whether or not you want it
i’m frostbit
and i have blue lips
bone teacher
the thought of parsnips
underground
wanting, gnawing numbers are her worm
wanting, a blizzard coming is her storm
a reckoning of beef, by frost on a leaf
or a vegan from Lesbos
i’m frostbit
and i want to cut her
bone teacher
but i think i love her
cold-bitter
waiting for the silence to come around
waiting for the mountains' thundering sound
but it’s not to do with me, and i can hardly see
the drip of an icicle
i’m frostbit
shivering in the glare
bone teacher
does she even care
she’s not there
icing, when her mercies are too few
icing, when she hides the glass from view
heartbeat in the snow, heartbeat going slow
and almost stopping
i’m frostbit
am i a grizzly bear
bone teacher
the question isn’t there
it’s nothing
stepping, her boots are laced so high
stepping, her pointer blinds the sky
glacial is her height, the emptiness of white
rumors of a pop quiz
i’m frostbit
darkness coming on
bone teacher
never seen the dawn
it’s marching
her bones are so grim, her cold does me in
or a pale horse riding
//
slow shuffling blues;
for my hs math teacher
Ms. Dyas <3
//
Phaedrus: (cont.) but where do you wish us to sit down and read? (anagignosko)
// 228ε
ἀλλὰ ποῦ δὴ βούλει καθιζόμενοι ἀναγνῶμεν;
//
Junonia atlites
to snap a ragged angel clutching stem
the blustering breeze away with solar air
her tissue wings flat flustered here to there
as clinging to the budding cluster to drink
she filled from galaxies of guava’s nectar
so stopped, or tried to stay, a messenger
from Juno sent, or born suffering soldier
of flight and heat, by fiery news arrived
by lunular and radiating “S”
each ocellus arrayed a revised scene
and partial pupils where crescents intervene
to turn a crimsoning into the sky
a pale or sight-depleted, shredded wing
robuster than my lens could burn, ash-worn
and torn edges, floating abandon as form
yet stellar grip, high hunger for her name
//
Phaedrus: (cont.) you’ve beaten me back (ekkrou-o) from my hope, O Socrates, that i would get to exercise (eggymnaz-o) on you
// 228ε
ἐκκέκρουκάς με ἐλπίδος, ὦ Σώκρατες, ἣν εἶχον ἐν σοὶ ὡς ἐγγυμνασόμενος
//
this be a verse
to razors and gashes
and stabbings and worse
no harm is intended
and it’s for the best
//
🕊️
//
& pace Larkin
triptych of the dog
//
a cicak dropped a souvenir on me
yesterday, savasana; it was
all happening, pure rejeki, a speck
for playing dead; the simmering night, the sawah
was fizzing and burping boggy chemistry
the gamelan deliberated depth
of banjar space, a soup of bronze and spittle
//
up i, cocks crowing death to rest, dark mind
the cat was sick again, shit cleaned, cats fed
the breath of rain, half-there, in vomit stepped
scrubbed vinegar again, who made the bed
i squinted past the dawn to wash a dish
the load of towels, it was not a test
the shape of chasing weather for a bone
//
and would the three of them have made a city—
Lysias, Lysias, Lysias; he wasn’t there
he wasn’t here, until bumbu for our sambal
did rain down from the sky, and i said Lord
i still deny that you’re an onion seller
how practice held like density, as though
svanasana could house the dog itself
//
🌒
//
see also Rabia Basri