i was digging in the garden
i was rooting up a rose
dreaming of a buried bone
listening to my nose

i sewed your face into it
and you told me no
my unclean mystery
i’m tearing up tatami

do you need the dog in me
should i paw at your door
i was sniffing in a corner
now i’m passed out on the floor

i smell like cat piss
i’ve been running in the rain
what is your mercy for
a reckoning of typhons

i’m in a foreign country
and i never knew a law
i weep at every stranger
my long tongue and stupid jaw

you don’t even want it
until you’re dying
and you don’t look at me
i miss you only

wandering the streets at night
‘cause good girls love to roam
and if i lost my reason
would i find you at home

all your mixed signals
i chew them into air
your body is so visible
bones buried everywhere

the wooden cross you carry
the weight on trembling knees
how do you carry crosses
if you don’t believe in trees

why do i bury them
why am i depressed
why am i in your garden
my garden is a mess

six angry shades of rosary
and every count has thorns
and if i turn the light on
what takes a shadow’s form

and could i fight it
or am i just a bluff
my smoke at midnight
my nothing is enough

three verticals upon the hill
at dawn there’s five or more
their arms the work of windmills
guardians of metaphor

vermilion edges
my painterly lines
flashing iridescence
my greener stigmata

the seams of Saint Veronica
the tilt of her golden leaf
and if the suffering savior
had denied her that relief

beloved breaking
my faltered knowledge
she’s in the dirty street
the hounds of resurrection

//

(a song /
a howls)

//

my dog sings
and my gremlin
speaks in iambs
or

currently reading:
The Tempest

//