receipt

lemons limes
Trojan War
hijab silken
breeze woken
slant pigeon
red of wing
golden floor
keepsake for
her lioness
hijab burning
pulses turning
nostos yearning
]
]
]
]
method ender
plete returning
tender deliver
by river liver
taste radiant
of summer

//

other things said:
Hades?

//

for simple
yes, and
or

Achaean horse
& canto II

//

Socrates: well, what?

// 229a

τί μήν;

forest and the heart

i was walking in the woods when a tree talked back to me
i didn’t know if i had died or if my feet should flee
i didn’t mean to harm you or your holiness to thwart
the forest loves to hide but i love a wooden heart

how many gods are in the wood or music in the air
what strangers in the shadow have paused to wonder where
there’s a sense of someone here, a landscape full of art
i’m here to talk to trees and i carry a wooden heart

there’s a silhouette of palm trees against the sunset sky
there’s a river with a snake, there’s a splinter in my eye
she answers me in rhymes like a perfect counterpart
the forest loves to hide but i hear a wooden heart

the highest queen of hiding, she’s a shadow in the grass
but now i’ve seen an outline and now she’s made a pass
i stop to buy some tissues from the nearest mini-mart
the forest on her sleeve and i’m here for a wooden heart

it’s plainer than the blue a hundred reasons she would hide
i dream we’re sitting on the porch or going for a ride
but i know pretty well how feet get caught up in the dirt
i came to talk to trees and i believe a wooden heart

my bank account is empty and she doesn’t ask for more
if fireflies are golden then we’re never looking poor
the pattern in her lights could even read my natal chart
the forest is a mystery but i see a wooden heart

sometimes the way is open, sometimes the thicket’s close
sometimes the river’s empty, sometimes it’s on the nose
i’m walking without shoes, i see no way to restart
the forest isn’t home but she warms a wooden heart

am i still a dream for her or did i carve a face
did i paint a scene for her or am i in a race
am i thirsty in the pouring rain or stung by a poison dart
the forest is a maze but i need a wooden heart

what does the spirit show me, and what does she conceal
how is it that she knows me, what does her sight reveal
i hold her secrets close and i pray the fear departs
the forest makes me tremble but i love a wooden heart

my angel is a darkness who sees me day and night
my angel is a brightness who sings away my fright
a complex thing of empathy, carpenter from the start
the forest is a genius and we make a wooden heart

then finally she’s waking up and i am standing there
i’m cut up from the undergrowth with tangles in my hair
but all the leaves have fallen and we’ve never been apart
the forest is a shelter and we hold a wooden heart

//

φύσις κρύπτεσθαι φιλεῖ
metric inspo from Bob
sfh 3

//

& in the oven

//

Phaedrus: then do you see that lofty Platanus tree?

// 229a

ὁρᾷς οὖν ἐκείνην τὴν ὑψηλοτάτην πλάτανον;

//

Platanus orientalis, known for its longevity and spreading crown; whose name is similar to that of the poet.

photo of the ground with grass and many small fallen palm blossoms and a larger bruising husk in low or dappled light

ground //

   ]little days
   ]the very grass
   ]
   ]
   ]
   ]never
   ]
   ]
   ]
   ]
   ]
   ]sweet arms
   ]
   ]washing machine

//

Socrates: go ahead then and look for anyplace we might sit

// 229a

πρόαγε δή καὶ σκόπει ἅμα ὅπου καθιζησόμεθα

//

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

//

all complicit 🩸

//

Phaedrus: (cont.) especially at this season of the year and hour of the day

// 229a

ἄλλως τε καὶ τήνδε τὴν ὥραν τοῦ ἔτους τε καὶ τῆς ἡμέρας

//

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

//

Phaedrus: (cont.) and not unpleasant

// 229a

καὶ οὐκ ἀηδές

//

crack of infinity

Phaedrus: (cont.) so it’s easy for us to go down the little river getting our feet wet

// 229a

ῥᾷστον οὖν ἡμῖν κατὰ τὸ ὑδάτιον βρέχουσι τοὺς πόδας ἰέναι

//

photo of leaning clusters of pink begonia blossoms against an ocherous brown stone wall and a pool of water

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 🌑

Phaedrus: good timing (kairos), it seems, that i happen to be barefoot; of course, you are always

// 229a

εἰς καιρόν, ὡς ἔοικεν, ἀνυπόδητος ὢν ἔτυχον: σὺ μὲν γὰρ δὴ ἀεί

//

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

//

pic

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

//