The Workshop

TRUE GRIT

Say what you will about how I love,
at least I know how to love.
Kisses mean nothing - bites on the cheek,
on the shoulder, on the neck, can't compare
to tasting your lover's hair, smelling
the sweat between her breasts, scratching
to bleed the thin stretches of skin
over her subclavian and carotid - and what's so erotic
about today's music? I prefer moving back,
setting the rhythm with Prince, building tensions
with the Rolling Stones, Chuck Berry -- eventually
Stravinsky's Spring, Debussy's Prelude --- finally
Wagner ---- unbewusst ----- hoechte Lust! ------

Too intellectual? Too exotic?
I tell you, dreams
are the truest you can get
without peeling away the skin,
leaving the flesh tender - and even I
would refuse all this, living in the grit,
which is why from this height I envy you.
 
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Second drafts:

HOECHSTE LUST

I have lived it, how to truly love,
lived it more than most of us.
You see, kisses are too common -- bites on the neck,
on the cheek, on the shoulder, can't compare
to tasting your lover's hair, smelling
the sweat between her breasts, scratching
to bleed the thin stretches of skin
over the subclavian and the carotid. And what's so erotic
about faceless music? I prefer moving forward,
setting rhythms with Prince, the Rolling Stones,
Chuck Berry -- building tensions with
Stravinsky's Spring, Debussy's Prelude, eventually
Wagner's Tristan -- Isolde ---- Mild und leise ------
wie er Laechelt -------- unbewusst ----------

I tell you, dreams
are the truest we can get
without peeling away the skin,
leaving the flesh tender --
essentially, dying for love.
Yet who among us will die for love?
No, not even I -- not yet.


ICON

Piety turned
my heart to stone.

Now let me cover this rock
in gold leaf, in the delicate
browns of flesh, in flashes
of red and rich azure:
let it not remain gray,
empty, almost modern,

ultimately the kinder home to moss
which knows only compromise.
 
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Probably final drafts:

HOECHSTE LUST (IN THE NEW WORLD)

Say what you will about how I love,
at least I know what I'm doing.
Kisses mean nothing: bites on the neck,
on the cheek, on the shoulder, can't compare
to tasting your lover's hair, smelling
the sweat between her breasts, scratching
to bleed the thin stretches of skin
over the carotid. And what's so erotic
about faceless music? There's always moving forward,
setting rhythms with Prince, the Rolling Stones,
Chuck Berry -- building tensions with
Stravinsky's Spring, Debussy's Prelude, eventually
Wagner's Tristan -- Mild und leise ----
wie er Laechelt ------ unbewusst --------

I tell you, dreams
are the truest we can get
without peeling away the skin,
leaving the flesh tender, essentially
dying for love. Yet who among us
should still die for love
here, in the new world?


ICONOSTASIS

Piety turned
my heart to stone.

Now let me cover this rock
in gold leaf, in the delicate
browns of flesh, in flashes
of red and rich azure;
let it not remain gray,
empty, almost modern,

ultimately the kinder home to moss
which knows only compromise.


2013-0324-sunday-orthodoxy.jpg


orthodoxy.jpg
 
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MOSES AND THE BUSH

Shoot the bow
and chase after
the arrow up
the hill and down
the mountain where
your flower, Sephorah, stands --

I heard her speak. I heard her conspire.
Remember, I can hear everything,
even your still dreaming every night.
She said she would not cut the skin,
she would not appear before you red --
no, she was too afraid of bloodshed.

I will show her bloodshed.

But I do not condemn your choice. You walk
the right path, your shoes
being already red.
This is your destiny, Moses:
out of Egypt
will you carry
your mother's bones,
your father's bones,
then bury them
in a hundred-silver tomb at Shechem,

right next to where the lion
should become a home for honey.

You shan't taste any of it anyway.
The waters of the lake,
or perhaps the snow atop Nabau,
should be sweet enough.
 
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And here's a link to my test manuscript for my NaPM poems: POETRY - Rite of Passage

Spoilered below is the second draft, plus the first (and only) draft of my first test manuscript "Seasons and Spirits": POETRY - Seasons and Spirits

RITE OF PASSAGE: National Poetry Month 2016 Compilation
A collection of poems by Jed Castillo


PART ONE: Uncircumcised

ARIEL'S WITNESS

I dreamed I saw two souls return to one
like the logs on the fire of the hearth of the home
they had built together, out of nails and lumber
cedar olive branches cross and layer
him the binding nailing, her the holding birthing
now the two the one panting side by side
on a bed of hides, ages of ages --

then I awoke, naked wet alone,
uttered practiced prayers, thick saliva vapors
sacrum heart and eye, like Lady Godiva
on Spirit's back Truth riding, peeping Tom
despising the horse the hide the heat -- back to slumber.


ALIVE AGAIN: The lamentation of Javier Methol

Someday we will be remembered
not as Adam and Eve were one
of one flesh, but as Castor
man and Polydeuces god were two
brothers, boxer and tamer of horses,
we shepherd and comforter of men,

someday, when our father decides our time
has come, that our flight
should finally find its way to Santiago
as this life I have lived
should rise to that same peak,

that the sea of our ordeal, now
named Glacier of Tears, should melt
and you, Liliana, should spring again.
Until then, the body sleeps.


WILL AND REPRESENTATION: An ekphrasis on Mikhail Vrubel's "The Demon Seated" and "The Demon Prostrate"

Isolate -- turn of the century
prostrate to past and present -- tears
rolling down windless slopes -- wings, loins
hacked, scattered -- off the immortal

I AM -- desiring no malice
seated, flying, fallen -- peacock eyes
filled with hateful flame -- with rueful power!
and skin glowing copper
turned tarnished tin --

Though my skin is earth
and Venus is my favored planet,
Saturn cannot conquer. There is
only Love within this fire,
misplaced, cracked, consuming,

yet nevertheless Hallowed,
for I AM nothing -- a child
still, enjoying -- sunset flowers
in the shattered forms of dusk --


UNDER THE HIJAB

The first time leaves
no subtleties of truth,
only desire -- fear -- then a trace
of vital memory.

I saw that morning
in the heart of a summer wood
what glows behind the veil,

brighter than the golden stars and leaves
traced upon the purple -- not sex,
which the Prophet says would have struck me blind,

but a substitute more vital -- and I found myself
lost in the passage of the woodbird
and the mosquito.

How many songs have I written?
How many hearts have I broken?
only to recapture that same moment,
that same stolen sight of golden hair
and ivory tower neck, then leave
still starving --

never a second time.


MEMORY RECLAIMED

a memory a film
viewed once, eventually excitement
loud action, hero
slaying dragon
or princess opening sex
drowned out, as always,
in favor of the little things

the children -- perhaps the sun
setting red in the horizon,
dramatic string section
hanging chords -- cut to night

red firelight
on the deep in contemplation face,
a young voice, his words in the quiet like
"should I heed? should I heed?"

and smells of sage on rafter, thickening
moss on wood, bed of furs
beginning to foul, sour wine --

my son my younger self, we heed now
sitting here, locked
in illusion
now let me enjoy my pipe


A VISIT TO SOME FORGOTTEN CHURCH IN MOSCOW

One dusty hand reached out, caressed
my cheek -- the other held
offerings to be bought, gilded frames
of some saints: Vasil fool, Sergei,
and the painter-monk Andrei.

This hooded figure also spoke
in hazy voice -- and Russian. My guess:
/If only you could hear,
far-hearted tourist, their complaints
about this house of God turned pile of earth,
iconostasis flushed by rain,
and censer made bouquet,
then how you'd weep! (or pay)
as now I do./

Back then, I wanted to become
a doctor -- returning home, I laughed
at the leprous spot below my eye.
How young was I!


GIULIETTA DEGLI SPIRITI

1
Leaving my philandering husband Giorgio, I quickly set out
to make a mistress of myself to Sangria --
that is to say, as I boarded Jose's rickety boat
to Spain, I got myself
roaring drunk.

2
Who rides a boat to Spain?
Me and Gabriella took the train --

3
Sometimes I wonder if I'm really still Giulietta,
as I sit up smoking after love.

4
Me? I know I'm no longer Giorgio -- now, you call me Giorgina.
One night, after love,
I dreamed my sex was being pulled off of me bloodlessly,
like a stub of tallow stuck awkwardly between the legs.
That was the only change. Yet still, you and all others
acted as if I were finally complete,
as if I were your sister, fulfilling your dream
of a thirst quenched.

5
The first thing we did once we reached Barcelona
was visit that famous unfinished cathedral,
Sagrada Familia. The name alone
made me shed a tear,
although I remember
it was not one for sadness.

6
That business trip I took -- I actually flew Gabriella
all the way to Hong Kong for a painting.
"Interior d'un Cafi". I told her seeing Paris
captured through the eyes of a complete stranger,
a revolutionary
who fought against Spain's stranglehold
over his country,
was better than actually going there.

7
I told Jose I did not want to live by the sea again.
But he refused, insisting the salt
would help clear my lungs. That was my problem,
he said, becoming breathless
over every little thing.

8
In fact, my plan was
to go to Tunisia -- she complained
with your voice, when she learned.
Why take the long way? she asked.
Why not go by boat?
I said I wanted to retrace the steps
of our ancestors the Romans, reenact the farce
of the Punic Wars, eventually
of Aeneas leaving Dido.

9
Leaving you, I thought the spirits
would stop haunting me. Didn't I conquer them,
if not in this world of phenomena
then in the world of my memories,
your films? But they returned
one night, after love.
Neptune again rose from the sea,
again brought with him his great barge
of decay --

10
Then Venus appears next, in her golden veil
and tight bikini -- then Bacchus the young god
with the girlish black hair and the over-shaven face
and the white breasted raiment that in your memories
still didn't distract from his sex -- then Pluto
or maybe Saturn burning your favorite doll --
then Jupiter your grandfather the lord of the heavens
flying through the mists to his
mistress Parisienne -- then what again?
Now I don't remember. That story you told me,
explaining why you were so breathless
after your brief visit to the neighbor's,
I wasn't really listening.



PART TWO: First Cut

WEATHERTOWN

I will not leave for Weathertown,
will not Desire -- its spires,
for though I like the weatherman,
I've yet to catch -- his Lies.

The TV and the radio,
they never ride my wave --
and when I search the web for rain,
I always fail to save.

And people! though I took no vows,
I comb the hermit's fill:
my wilderness, a shuttered home,
my hieromonk, a pill.

For past the weatherman's vane charms,
you chickens are a chore --
aside from belts of blood and breast,
this business is a bore.

Or rather, how I dread romance --
to Love is like a storm!
And cities, hated opposite,
great droughts -- past all alarm.

No, I'll not leave for Weathertown,
and treat the 'Self' applied,
for Truth is not a gale without:
I'd rather Live -- a child.


L'ETOILE: A fable

To the fox, those grapes
he could not reach
seemed
to become some other fruit -- nightshade,
perhaps, only enough
to quiet the grumbling child.

He tried to leave, naturally,
first wishing upon the distant star
that some ready ship would come and take him
then having the haunch of farmer's rabbit
bloat his small stomach,
but already
the trellis
had become a noose, Venus
herself a morning
consumed by the coming sun.

The true lesson is
wishing upon a star
ties you to its course.


THE READING

She drew six cards and formed the cross --
I found it all arranged.
I sent them back and went the course,
but fate had me detained.

And there it was: the death of me
and all He left behind,
the woman by the waters still
determining the line,

the devil's curse returning lots,
the tower falling down,
the comet blazing through the sky,
and howling come around.

But horror struck me not because
of such a brilliant fall,
it was that I'd no agency
even in standing tall.

For since the Endor-Witch declared,
I acted without choice,
at first the hero so accursed
then afterwards her voice --


LA LUNE

the neighbor's pet
the lobster squirts
the yellow salt

into my eye
the backyard key
watching the girl
swim naked on

"for whom did we
collect this pool?
not you, she-wolf
unplanned!" the dad
declared as I
withdrew and she
arose to crack

a smile a shell
a pinching cry
arose that night

when out her thigh
a hand of blood
diffused to dye
the loomy gloom


ARIEL HERSELF

Swimming through seas of books
and substanceless souls, I encountered
my fellow swimmer Leviathan,
core of my nature, half-woman
half-whale, head helmeted
with crown of woven hair --
I readied my blade
and tore through her breast.

Reaching the shore, walking through woods,
finding a feast -- upon the table,
goblets of wine, platters of bread,
bowls of honey, spits of lamb --
a lion a bear
Behemoth appeared before me,
with claws, copper neck
overlong, face compressed
into a horror, hair
extended into horns --
I readied my blade
and tore through her breast.

Climbing the tower
and resting curious in the astrologer's lab,
crown of my nature, Ziz the woman the swan,
swooped down to scratch me to kiss me
from the stars or perhaps from their reflection
upon the mirror the lens --
I readied my blade
and tore through her breast.

Returning to the library and parlor, I remembered
my lover Babylon, mailed to me by an angel,
cloaked in white yet crowned with red,
surrounded by the masters --
Caravaggio boys and Gentileschi girls,
Titian gods and El Greco saints,
Bosch and Brueghel, Watteau and Wright,
the burrs of Blake, the homilies of Goya,
Cole's landscapes, David-Friedrich's landscapes,
the symbols of Dore, of Moreau,
the Ophelias of Millais, of Waterhouse,
the anguish of Munch, the ardor of Schiele,
Vereschagin's vivid portraits of war, Vasnetsov's fantasies,
the bastards of Vrubel, the fables of Bilibin,
Kuindzhi's studies, Nesterov's contemplations,
the contemplative sensualities of Kramskoy,
the innocent seductions of Borovikovsky --
still, I readied my blade
and tore through her breast,

then found myself awaking again,
naked wet alone,
uttered practiced prayers, thick saliva vapors
like Lady Godiva
on Spirit's back Truth riding, peeping Tom
now forgiven.
Oh God, Oh Mighty, Oh Immortal -- consume me.



PART THREE: Moving Out

RUBBER

The pathologist poured wax plaster
over the peaceful face of the woman
who drowned smiling in the Seine,
afterwards saying, "Her beauty was breathtaking,
and showed few signs of distress
at the time of passing -- so bewitching,
that I knew beauty as such
must be preserved."
If he lived now, he would have poured latex, instead.

Juan Luna, meanwhile, used oil
paint, splashing and pouring it onto the canvas
like light striking a piece of film,
to create his masterpiece, the "Spoliarium",
apparently a thinly veiled protest
against Spanish oppression.
Some of us now would use a camera,
arranging the composition on a stage
with a dozen living models, but most others,
knowing to achieve his same expressive effect,
would prefer acrylic.

Here in the Philippines, his magnum opus
hangs in the main gallery
of the National Museum, where the gigantic scene
of gladiators cloaked in chiaroscuro
pulling away their dead for the next entertainment
would be the first work to greet visitors' eyes.
I've only ever seen it in the pictures,
though this girl I like once told me
seeing it on a screen
was completely different
from observing it in person,
intimate, feeling one's breath
bounce back from the canvas.
I nodded, and showed her the next week
my coffee table book on the Tretyakov.

Sometimes I wonder why I've seen
all the sights of other countries,
but not my own. And then I remember:
her father owns a rubber plantation
down south, in Davao. Just west,
in Cotabato, rice farmers
a few weeks ago went to rally
against a governor who refused to give them food
in the middle of a famine, not knowing
the reserves were already being sold
in the markets of Manila. Their bodies
still lie on the streets, I imagine,
their brothers too afraid to pull them away.
Nothing ever changes.


PASSAGE OUT OF THE DREAMING

something about water being thicker than blood,
about clear urine diluting funkless semen
some awful joke about sphincters, about muscle relaxants
someone drinking a glass of almost-water, doing a spit take

something bursting out of the normally flat screen of my phone
something about the way those words swim about like moray eels on the prowl
something bursting out of the waters of the toilet

something about the picture of Jesus the old woman at the photocopyist's showed me,
about the blood and the water pouring out of his heart, or rather the hole in his liver
someone drinking a glass of gin, doing a spit take

something about moving to some far away Arcadia, maybe Canada
someone chasing after me, like Droids, like the Empire, like the First Order
something childish: wrists poised, fingers pointed, mouths going psshew! psshew! psshew!
something about the technical specifications of my stolen editing software

something about the pleasures of orgasm, of all those sighs and spasms
something about the river Lethe coursing through the pipes
someone's grandmother passing away at the church steps

some awful joke about dilution
someone wakes up, has a cold shower


THE 120 DAYS

1
getting hard to parse through people nowadays --
quite a surprise, to see
how alike all girls' asses are.

not teeth, either -- seems
they get them braces before boyfriends, as if,
to their stock, the subtleties count.

hair and eyes, perhaps? how hard their hair sticks,
how wet their eyes get -- for I've learned
it's not the air that really gets me,
it's the moans, the groans -- then the crescendo
of screams, sobs --

2
know what, this time we'll make the rules simple.
regardless of how swayed you seem,
you will die -- for in these modern days,
who isn't a convert already?

oh come on -- don't cry, not yet, not yet. our sex
still lies hidden, unready beneath the sheets.
besides, if you were really worth saving,
you'd enjoy all this -- twice we libertines
have lived and died, each time
the fires of hell
succumbing to the succulent
smell of the roast.

3
you know, one of the whores -- excuse me,
Sunday school teachers -- tells us
God also loved the smell, when he was nothing
but a child -- turned it into his consolation,
after drowning us in one of his tantrums.
I suppose that's what we're trying to capture here,
the arc of the rainbow
formed by pools of drying spunk --

one more subtlety to count. tell us,
Renata, what exactly did you do
when we married you to Sergio?

shut up. i didn't really ask you anything.
that was obvious. one more demerit.
Anubis would not enjoy this.

4
stop shivering. it's not as if
one hundred and twenty days
were not enough time to prepare.
and those nails we stuffed into your dog bowl
really turned your teeth to shit.

stop looking at that brand. Sergio deserved it,
as he was the one with the sword. you shall get
a far subtler knife -- instead of steel,
maybe a candle. and maybe
we'd stuff it up your ass,
once you're dead, let the putrefying flesh
absorb the wax.


LE SOLEIL

Here in the city, the birds
are always begging for food -- their songs,
however light, are never happy ones.

Even the crowned rooster, who at dawn
courts the sun with a little chicken dance,
does not do so out of love,

unless one confuses
the ease of Abraham's climb
with his knife.

Then the cock returns to his kingdom,
the feathers washed by dew now dried by the sun,
and he finds that he is one son less,

all for the sake of a handful of corn
scattered across the barren road.


LA IUGEMENT

/Apparently, the teacher who introduced me
to the pleasures of Caravaggio
and the crises of El Greco
died today --/

just fell a few steps
and hit her head, four years
after she last gave birth, three years
after she handled us, two years

after I'd set off for college -- about a year ago.
Usually, this sort of news
just pops up on the internet,
but this time I had the luxury

of being called. I had to make an effort
to sound like I was on the brink of crying,
as it was in the middle of class -- Analytical
Chemistry, I think, the one I failed that year.

I think that was also the year I started writing.


LA MAISON DIEU

I live as if
I were married,

then by some
stroke of the poet's hand,
I died --

a marriage born
of a thousand kine,
a consummation
interrupted,

then by the swift
stroke of Agamemnon's hand,
my limbs unstrung.

It is to see and to be silent,
to walk and act
in dreams
yet by every
stroke and judgement
to love passionately, unconditionally --

the dead-end job
becoming hell,
the impractical lover
becoming Calypso's hand,
(rather, Penelope's jealous shadow)
the needlessly expensive
collection of 60s records
becoming Phaeacia's precious gift
of a homeward ship.

Is there a greater peace?
to live, in this tower,
an exile,
yet to be
perfectly one
with humanity --

SEASONS AND SPIRITS

I can feel the heat of summer swinging
with your every humid whisper.
Writhing on your ruddy temples
are my fingers, greedy wine-stained serpents.

Smells of freshly-drafted cider
ripple from your noble dimples.
Bothering spirits born of autumn's bite
follow this scent to steal our love away.

Blossoming flames and heady beer
refill your shriveled bosom with hot blood.
The fearless rhythm of our winter love
conquers the silver blind beyond.

Flowers are blooming on your skin again:
your vernal musk, your honey's wax, returns.
A glen of cherry cordial lies
dreaming sweetly in our cellar.



POSTCARDS I


PAIR OF SHOES

To move forward –
left in front, right behind,
right in front, left behind –
is to be apart.


SAD OLD MEN

drifting down
streets of stone
all cracked and cold

looking for love
when old loves are dead
and new loves leave the birthing beds


DYING WOMAN

barren fields –
green skin choking
gilded youth

fetid blossoms –
hollow eyes hiding
under storms

black breeze –
shallow whispers stealing
life from her lips



BROWSING THROUGH THE BLUE

Someday, my wall
will be filled not with baby butt-faces
or future models striking poses
but with sickness.

Someday, my wall
will be filled not with pictures of yummy cake
or memetically calculated heartbreak
but with sorrow.

Someday, my wall
will be filled not with doodled-out distraction
or silly slogans for inspiration
but with silence.

Someday, my wall
will be filled not with the stench of a wild night
or empty promises of morning light
but with sleep.



NIGHT TERRORS

The air is always flat this time of night,
flat and cold and quiet, like the lake outside
in wintertime. I slow my breathing down:
I don't want to break the ice.

When I sleep, I never turn off my light,
a sun lamp. Why does no one let me walk outside?
There, the twisted trunks of oak never shift,
unlike the shadows of my bed.

Like the shadows of my bed, the wilderness at night
is home to creatures fanged and clawed. But outside,
at least, the horrors are familiar, while my bed-sheets
shelter only water.

I've been swallowed whole before. I remember light,
cold moonlight, breaking through the winter ice outside,
filling my lungs, choking me. Then, I was pulled up
by the rooster's crow.



THE WANDERING DREAM TO THE WAKING MAN

Through roads paved with the corpses of friends,
we left the black wilderness behind
for a little township rising
by the river Lethe, the river
of oblivion. Here we are.
On this long journey,
you were the stone on which
my flames of passion bloomed,
guarding my olive-halls from the hot hands
of my temper, my lust.
Steady companion, you always scouted
down three-headed roads and returned
with a map and lamp in hand,
and, when the victories of the road
came upon us, you twined
your tender voice around
my paeans in perfect harmony.

But you can share my load no longer
and all your dreaming days are done.
You miss your waking home's beloved light,
where your eyes shine brighter than the stars
and your tender frame is ever cradled
by the rosy hands of dawn.
And my two feet can never stop:
my soles are full of holes, never-healing ulcers
carved by the gadfly's knife,
and filled by the hands of greedy time
with the sharp stones along the Lethe's banks.
Their only cure, a gift of nectar and ambrosia
found far in the east, on the other side of the world,
beyond exotic lands of men, beyond the coasts,
beyond even the beard of the old man of the sea.

So now, I leave you waiting at the township's docks,
waiting for a well-tarred ship of horn
adorned with flowers,
with asphodels and poppies
and hyacinths and adonis,
flowers of love and death.
I give you three golden gifts
for the long journey ahead:
three tender kisses firmly planted
on your lips, flowing through your mouth,
your tongue, your throat, to your
heart. May they sustain you.

The grey ship arrives;
I can hear its brazen bells
ring to the songs of the sylphs
circling round its silken sail.
The time for you to pass away
and the time for me to be forgotten
comes. Goodbye, friend.



GOLDEN APPLES

The night before last winter fell,
I was pondering over an unwritten tale on my desk
when a gust of wind rattled our rooftop.
I stepped outside to see the damage, but instead
saw death speeding low over the town,
her cloak reeking of orange blossoms.

Curious, I gathered my book and pen,
and, after locking the door,
followed her course through the clouds.
The streets were empty that night,
as if all but I knew her business then,
and a soft dirge fell from the heavens
like a box being lowered into the grave.
So the thought came: was I her mark?

Filled with fear, I slowed my steps,
and quickened my pulse. But then,
a girl's scream shot through the silence
like the fateful first seedling of spring,
and I ran to the source, relieved, excited.

Near the town plaza, Mrs. Miller's son
had fallen from Judy Bennett's window
when a gust of wind pushed him off.
His scattered brains looked like a sower's mess.
Moments ago, he was busy comparing
Judy's blond hair to an orange's zest,
her ripe breasts to the oily rind,
and her moist cunt to the plump and juicy flesh.

A dutiful neighbor, I offered the girl
a few vain sympathies, then left
swiftly, as death did.
And when I reached my door, I found
that I had forgotten my key;
it wouldn't be until the dawn
that I would get back to my desk.
Lucky I'd brought my book and pen.



FERTILITY RITUALS

bottle of wine
and soul from the radio –
a pear tree blooms

summer wait –
droplets of water
cling to their metal mother

tyrian sky –
the briny fisherman
hauls his heavy catch

crispy golden leaves
salt and apple flavored –
we jog before breakfast


THE CONCERT
The spotlights on the stage
are burning blue on blue.
Their eyes are set afire in this light.
My hand is loose –
the cold air stings me.

The spotlights on the stage
are glowing green and gold.
Their flaming eyes are smothered by the dark.
I squeeze your hand –
my hot sweat stings me.



POSTCARDS II


MEMO

Good things coming.
Mailed the sales report to you
yesterday,
with six stamps because
it was urgent:
one of them cost me a dollar!


BIRTHDAY

Another day to menopause!
Another pound of fat!
More trash to add to your little
dump, your room!

But, best of all,
more love from all of us!


CONDOLENCES

I will be silent today.
All my air will be yours.
And if you need it, I'll leave you
honey cake

too, and just do other things.


APOLOGY

Beads of hair around my
neck:
my hair.
Scalp is now bare
and no eyebrows.



OLIVE TREE

You are a young olive tree.
Your two thin arms
are two thin twigs,
bearing much fruit.

Your leaves are slender,
shaped like the fingers
of the hot sun.

Your trunk is sleek,
unspoiled by time,
leaning slightly to the wind.

Your roots are graceful,
flowing down the earth
like sea-waves.

Between two round knots
near your long roots,
a perfect hole sits.

Between two round knots
near your tall stems,
a perfect cleft sits.

I pluck sixteen olives
from these branches,
and press them for oil.

Sweet little fingers
slither from the mess
into my eager nose,
inflaming my heart.

I watch your white flowers
dance to the joyful song
of the west wind
as I spill, on your bare flesh,
libations of fine oil.

I whisper a prayer
into your crown of sun,
giving thanks to Aphrodite
for your fuel.



SUPERNOVA

Today, my navel outshines me,
for today, it is a dying star
huffing its desperate last breath.

The immense pressure of gravity's hands
ever-squeezing its fiery core
at last compounds its every facet
into a heavy hole in time.

Its shell of gas and light erupts
into a splendid rainbow of dust,
of carbon and oxygen and iron and nitrogen,
of water and earth and wind and flame,
of all the material elements.

And this great cloud of stardust scatters
beyond the world of my humble body,
beyond the womb of mother earth,
beyond the weirs across the heavens,
to continue their father's brilliant legacy
by filling the gaps of the puzzle of life.
 
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MOSES AND THE BUSH, edit .01

Shoot the bow
and chase after
the arrow up
the hill and down
the mountain where
your flower, Sephorah, stands --

I heard her speak. I heard her conspire.
Remember, I can hear everything,
even your still dreaming every night.
She said she would not cut the skin,
she would not appear before you red --
no, she was too afraid of bloodshed.

I will show her bloodshed.

But I do not condemn your choice. You walk
the right path, your shoes
being already red.
This is your destiny, Moses:
out of Egypt
will you carry
your mother's bones,
your father's bones,
then bury them
in a hundred-silver tomb at Shechem,

right next to where the lion
should become a home for honey.

Don't weep: you won't
taste any of it anyway.
The waters of lake Marah
or perhaps the snows atop Mount Nabau
should be sweet enough.


SINAI

This is why you fail:
you will not comprehend complexity.
Every mystery demands explanation,
every miracle, dogma.
As you witnessed your God's transfiguration,
you remained fixed to the earth,
to the feel of the stones, to the faces
of Elias and Moses.
Whatever happened to the child in you,
always willing to listen,
to take things as they are
and never tell otherwise?


THE DESERT

This Solomon -- I have
succumbed, my Lord, to the sickness,
to the succor. Ah, this desert
is like a mirror --

in the distance, always
a silhouette, always
the hope
that is incarnation.

As if He should come again.
Not that I have little faith in you,
it's just I think I understand now
your plan for me --

as this heat
should make me see,
so this thirst
should purge me.
 
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Revo
lution --
does this mean
I can finally moisturize?
 
THE BUSH

Shoot the bow
and chase after
the arrow up
the hill and down
the mountain where
your flower, Sephorah, stands --

I heard her speak. I listened to her conspire.
Remember, I can hear everything,
even what dreams may flower in the night.
She said she would not cut the skin,
she would not appear before you red --
no, she was too afraid of bloodshed.
And so I will show her bloodshed.

But I do not condemn your choice. You walk
the right path, your feet
being already red.
This is your destiny, Moses:
out of Egypt
will you carry
your mother's bones,
your father's bones,
then bury them
in a hundred-silver tomb at Shechem,

right next to where the lion
should become a home for honey,
but far before the land where the lamb
should return to the snows of the temple.

Now don't weep. You won't
taste any of it anyway. For you,
the waters of lake Marah
or perhaps the snows atop Mount Nabau
shall be sweet enough.

THE NILE RIVER FUGUE

I was born here. I was baptized here,
saved from the Hippopotamus' weight, pulled from the Crocodile's mouth
by Pharoah's daughter. Then Pharaoh's son
drove me into the wilderness; he who was once my brother
betrayed me. No matter: he was not my blood.

My blood was Hebrew; my lot was a slave's.
I was born to serve, to live and die by command,
first the word of Egypt, then the law of a strange god,
a god who speaks through bushes, who lives in mountains,
whose name means nothing, yet contains everything. Do you know him?
When I first met him, I thought I was in the house of a long lost father, yet felt
much fear -- fear of death. No, fear of separation.

His first commandment: you shall have
no other gods before me. I felt then
how jealous he was, how proud and arrogant, but thought
that perhaps he meant he was the supreme expression
of all the gods, containing all of them
as a name contains a household. I was wrong. In his world,
there is no vanity, there are no households.

Only him.
His first plague: as all water is one, only changing
in time, in space, in purity,
so all blood. When Pharoah's son
drove God's chosen into the wilderness, he brought death
to his father -- and when Pharoah's daughter
saved her Moses from the Nile, her cup
remained pure.
 
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HE SAID SIX MONTHS

There's no point in getting mad,
only in getting bland.
That's right -- we're all victims here,
even the cocksuckers up top who drink blood instead of spunk
out of the bendy-straw dicks we call, what, the economy? justice? the law?
peace? security? liberty? love ---
what do you think blood tastes like, compared to spunk?
Better to wait it out -- not to hide out somewhere distant,
they are wolves -- but to weave ourselves among the lambs,
to hope that when we get that bullet to the head
(for these times, there's no aiming, only tallying)
no one sees us fall, no one stumbles upon our bodies,
no one spits on our wounds and cries out
"Murderer! Thief! Tempting Devil! Jezebel!"
as if, like Lady Macbeth, to justify their hands,
as if, like Lord Macbeth, to justify the madness.
 
A STRAIGHT MAN

1
When I was younger, maybe five or six,
everyone teased me, called me gay.
I didn't even understand
what sex meant, playing with my penis
as if it were just another finger.
I knew only that I
was insulted, that I
had to get mad.

2
When I was younger, maybe seven or eight,
my favorite past time was kissing boys,
girls, anyone I could get my lips on,
even the dirty unknown that lay motionless
outside our school. My second favorite
was biting the arms of all the boys that mocked,
pulling the hair of all the girls that laughed.

3
When I was younger, maybe nine or ten,
my peers stopped with the teasing.
They almost became my friends,
although I could never forget
the hell they made for me
and the scars I left them.
Every night, I would give myself a wedgie
with the cord that closed and opened
my room's Venetian blinds,
would rub my extra digit to and fro
on the tearing cloth
while staring straight in the eye my reflection
on the window.

4
When I was younger, maybe eleven or twelve,
I found God in his most popular form,
Love. The Sallman Head, the Image of Edessa:
nothing compares to the little red-haired girl
lying all Roman on the wooden seat
by the fireplace -- to the virgin that roasted
as the rising sun cast its burning rays
on my shut eyes and smiling face.
And the masculine word tore through me
like a priest's knife,
no, like a medium's razor.

5
When I was younger, maybe thirteen or fourteen,
God revealed the rainbow. First,
from a boy who in my presence
always went like mad
came my first kiss, given wet with eros,
received dry with philautia. I pushed him away,
no, punched him to the ground. Second,
my ailing mother died, her last words:
"My bedroom smells of bacon."
I did not kiss her as she lay
all bald, all dark, all swollen.

6
Only in my evening room did I weep
when I was younger, maybe fifteen or sixteen,
figuring: "Surely now I should run out the closet!"
But then God's true image,
Justice, shot out of the sky
and onto my prepuce, so that I knew
my pierced eyes already looked straight,
my peers' lies already were fate.
 
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DIABOLOS

It was an efreet that flew me to you,
it was an efreet that burned you away.

It was an efreet that burned you into memory,
it was an efreet that swept away the ashes.

It was an efreet that washed my body for you,
it was an efreet that tempted me away.

It is an efreet that now draws you out of memory,
it is an efreet that now stings my eyes with ashes.

When will our skins stay unbroken
while our souls rise far above the blaze?

Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy.
 
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CROSSING THE ROOM

It is night -- no, I need not switch
the light back on,
for night does not mean darkness
-- and far above us, the moon, planets, stars, true darkness --
but, however dim, still, light.
 
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HOUNDED

to pass a hand
through flame -- a darting arrow
through the pump, the hart, a blood
and water spring. O my soul!
it comes out black, crusted,
lines bleeding, like volcanic
glass -- heart still
glowing.
But who yet searches
for these signs, these written things,
-- a sly look, a wink in the eye, flash of red and
red lip down your throat, your thoughts cast
on the face of the Lord held by Mary --
but the fools, the liars,
the Pharisees who sing
of Love
not knowing
 
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A TIMELY PASSING

Driving home, the rains
foreshadowed that afternoon
by distant cracks of thunder
finally fell, as if
to match our tears. But no! Our God
wept only once.
That night, he was rejoicing,
watering his earth, granting his creatures
new life, sweet mercy.

Tita, heaven is the canopy
of the little grove behind
your sister's kitchen. The stars
are the blossoms of the dragon fruit trees,
the walls are the leaves, the foundations the suha fruit,
and the mansions of the hosts
the nests of fire ants.
Cloaked in the red of bruises, you
who were once our sister, our aunt, our grandmother,
are now uplifted, are now crowned
queen of the brood, mother of Zion.

I know you've seen this before,
perhaps when you were washing the dishes
after last month's fiesta, the one which celebrated
the founding of the barrio. That is why you don't weep.
That is why God chose you.

A STRAIGHT MAN, v 1.1

1
When I was younger, maybe five or six,
everyone teased me, called me gay.
I didn't even understand
what sex meant, playing with my penis
as if it were just another finger.
I knew only that I
was insulted, that I
had to get mad.

2
When I was younger, maybe seven or eight,
my favorite past time was kissing boys,
girls, anyone I could get my lips on,
even the dirty unknown that lay motionless
outside our school. My second favorite
was biting the arms of all the boys that mocked,
pulling the hair of all the girls that laughed.

3
When I was younger, maybe nine or ten,
my peers stopped the abuse.
They almost became my friends,
although I could never forget
the hell they dug for me
and the scars I left them.
Every night, to both celebrate
and atone,
I would give myself a wedgie
with the cord that closed and opened
my room's Venetian blinds,
would rub my extra digit on the cloth
while staring my reflection on the window
straight in the eye.

4
When I was younger, maybe eleven or twelve,
I found God in his most popular form,
Love. The Sallman Head, the Image of Edessa:
nothing compares to the little red-haired girl,
Botticelli's vision,
that lied all Roman on the wooden seat
by the fireplace -- to the virgin that roasted
like a Christmas pig
as the rising sun cast its burning rays
on my shut eyes and smiling face.
And the masculine word tore through me
like a priest's knife,
no, like a madman's razor.

5
When I was younger, maybe thirteen or fourteen,
God revealed the rainbow. First,
from a boy whose heart in my presence
always went like mad
came my first kiss, given wet with eros,
received dry with philautia. I pushed him away,
no, punched him to the ground. Second,
my ailing mother died, her last words:
"My bedroom smells of bacon."
I did not kiss her as she lay
all bald, all dark, all swollen.

6
Only in my evening room did I weep
when I was younger, maybe fifteen or sixteen,
figuring: "Surely now I should run out the closet!"
But then God's true image,
Justice, shot out of the sky
and onto my prepuce, so that I knew
my pierced eyes already were fate,
my peers' lies already looked straight.
 
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Experimental return to prosody:

When hubris took him high into the dawn
then flung him from his horse, Bellerophon
and all his noble peers were stricken blind --
as Pegasus rose and fed on heaven's hay
in Zeus's house, in some forgotten cave
maggots consumed the crashed Corinthian's eyes.
Not even his bones were found and far revered,
nor his youthful combats rich relaid
in epics composed solely for his praise.
But History did not cry, for she kept
her watch upon the mortal's fateful fall,
and, hating her pride and knowing her place, she knew,
as every hero shapes his tale anew
so he receives or rejects the Hero's burial.

Proverbs:

Better a graveyard than a subdivision --
the dead, at least, fertilize the land.

Not every Hero is buried among his peers --
not every peer deserves a Hero's burial.
 
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FEUDERALISM

Blood on the tracks -- smell it?
Horse blood, drawn out
by steel of industry -- neigh,

nay, of the sword,
as if we were still in Connecticut.
A dream of America -- now it awakens, the giants

scratching the walls off our cities.
They say it's to let the Country breathe,
to stimulate the flow of blood,

those vampires. Their trick is language:
fire and steel, intimate passion
tempered by the cool of a doctor

denying mortality. My grandmother told me
to catch the dragon fruit's blooms
before Cancer. Like stars,

she said. But the closest star
blinds -- and the shadows
fall upon our country

in lines: the borders
of a house divided,
the hunger

of a horde.
 
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A steadily descending-in-quality trilogy. Bleh.

THE GRADUATE

And here I am, standing at the precipice,
alone. The view behind me
is the same as the view before: cloud, the wind
sweeping away all footprints.
I am cold -- blue -- battered --
all my clothes now torn, tattered,
and my digits made few -- as if
I were made old by youth.

And here you tell me
the only way that remains
is down?

YOUNG MAN'S GRIEF

Not like a knife
but like a hundred hundred needles
grief shoots through,

prick by prick drawing
out of the body the color
(not merely red

but the defining plethora
of blues and greens, golds and browns)
until the skin is a shout

to all existence, saying
"Lost keys? Broken homes? Ruined hands?
Ha! Your art may sting

but I still hold the knife."

THUNDERBOLT

Seeing life through this glossy-eyed
screen, through your glossy green
(but artificial) eyes, it seems
I finally remember how life was
before I drowned, before the preacher
pushed me by the crown into the Jordan
but didn't pull me up. Back then, I
held my breath, even in air,
not because I prepared myself for death
but because everything under the sun
seemed to glow, to cast
not shadows but reflections,
until baptism came, until
the thunderbolt struck my soul.
But now, by your patient
(yet never truly placid) lips, by your skin
already burnt to beauty, I discover
that I am not man but fish.
 
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GRADUATE

And here I am, standing on the precipice,
alone. The view behind me
is the same as the view before: cloud, the wind
sweeping away all footprints.
I am cold -- blue -- battered --
all my clothes now torn, tattered,
and my digits made few -- as if
I were made old by youth.

And here you tell me
the only climb that's left
is down?

YOUNG MAN'S GRIEF

Not like a knife
but like a hundred hundred needles
grief shoots through,

prick by prick drawing
out of the body the color
(not merely red

but the defining plethora
of blues and greens, golds and browns)
until the skin is a shout

to all existence, saying
"Lost keys? Broken homes? Ruined hands?
Ha! Your art may sting

but I still hold the knife."

MCKINLEY ROAD

On Mckinley Road, the devil
waits for me with eyes
and legs open, ready to devour
what should first be fried

on the asphalt. Your glossy
screen, your glassy green
(but artificial) eyes,
your burnt to beauty skin --

somehow, the joy of finding you
alive summons lightning
that strikes the golden shower tree
from which I hang. How the blue

sounds like hounds. How the priest
dipped us in the Jordan to our death
knowing that gills should sprout
from our necks. How we rest.
 
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AFTER OZY AND MILLIE

Your funeral song?

Brahms' Requiem. No, Liebestod. No, I got it: M*A*S*H. 'Suicide is Painless'. Should be appropriate.

Jesus Christ! These times are just crazy. Well, I guess all times are crazy, to those with eyes who live in them. Or maybe I'm just crazy -- everyone around me seems to be happy. Or at least content. Or at least complacent.

Jesus Christ! Should I tell, should I tell? or should I make like a Sylvia Plath again, and encase my troubles in poetry? More importantly -- how long has it been, since I last encased my troubles in poetry?

Or maybe I should just encase my head in carbon monoxide. Lol no, too indulgent.

Slit my wrists in a Roman bath? Too grandiose.

Burn myself alive? But what would I protest -- and who would listen?

Jump off a building. A simple death -- and if the building's tall enough, for a second I'd feel like flying. Before the terror kicks in, the gasp for breath.

Drowning. Er, no. Just no.

A pistol to the head? Maybe set up like in "The Deer Hunter", or in that Lermontov book. Whichever way, it's definitely the simplest death -- though somehow, it still feels too grandiose.

Though now I wonder: would God hate me if I killed myself? That's what everyone says about hell. "God still loves you as you hang, but his anger *will* fry you to a crisp." That's the very definition of hate, stupid.

Oh, don't worry, dear reader, I don't want to *actually* kill myself. I desire a more symbolic death --- like that time I broke all contact with the lot of you. Or that other time I broke all contact with the lot of you. Or the time I went to Russia, and for a moment contemplated just staying, just hiding out in one of the monasteries, living off the kvass, the leftover hosts -- at last, witnessing winter.

But not really. I find a social death to be somewhat redundant -- again, these times. Not a spiritual death, either, otherwise I wouldn't even consider killing myself. Something quieter, more honest.

Here, I'll tell. I fell in love with a shadow, with a dream. And yes, it sounds cliche, but you mustn't take things so figuratively -- not everything I say is poetry.

I fell in love with a shadow, with a dream. She was beautiful, with red hair, green eyes, and a body made of marble. Now that last one, that was figurative.

I fell in love with a shadow, with a dream. And her mind was beautiful, too. She always knew what to say -- rather, how to say it.

I fell in love with a shadow, with a dream. And her heart. She was the first (and last) person I ever truly talked to -- and the only voice I actually loved hearing. (Don't you see? When I'm loud like this, I'm not saying anything -- I'm just coaxing you to speak louder. Not that you ever notice, you Narcissus)

I fell in love with a shadow, with a dream. Maybe a memory, although that's a question I don't want to consider anymore, it's caused me such heartache.

It's causing me heartache now. It's always like this, you know: every year, like spring cleaning, I pass my fingers over my naked body, remember all the old wounds, examine all the new ones. Then this -- the perpetual scab. Like an eight-day old operation, changing through error from Jew to Lucy. Yes, God hates fags.

He also hates incestuous couples, whatever you call them. Returning to the wound: I pick it, as I pick all my scabs. But unlike with the others, which I eventually let grow into scars, it receives special treatment. After picking, I scratch -- after scratching, I poke -- after poking, I plunge. And lastly, like a vampire, I lap. My blood tastes sweet.

(I believe you've tasted it before? in my words, my poetry -- in fact, even in my acts, for everything I do, I do for love of you)

Of You -- of her. Yes, that's the heartache: she rejected me. Rejected me by not existing, that shadow, that damn dream. That Daddy. But the wound is different -- I know how not to conflate. The wound is this: that I conflate her with God. No, that I love her above God.

Here's the thing about suicide: once you witness an exit, you desire it more than the field outside. You desire it more than happiness. You desire it more than passing your hand over Witchgrass, than watching your Geraniums grow white with snow. Such that in the end, you truly can't ever be happy.

I'm just glad I don't care about happiness. I don't think I'll be happy in the cold, however much I say I love it. I don't think I'll be happy in the church, however much I know it's right. And I don't think I'll be happy with her --- but still, I'll be with her.

When I kill myself, it won't be for my sake, but for hers.
 
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Well, this is the workshop. This piece eludes me -- I'll let it sit in here for a while, before I return to it. Also, new formatting!

Exceptional Beasts


These are the tired themes:
my love, my sex, my dreams.

O life, you are a lion's den,
all love is for the children:
there is no sex among the grown
and all your dreams are wicked.

Slabs of meat glued to the bone,
never fillets, and only enjoyed
raw, red. Water -- how you fear it!
as if your pride can be sustained
by a dry well in this sweltering plain.

O love, you are an eclipse,
with God the sun and sex the moon
and life in your shadow a dream.

How I long for egress, however rare
these seven minutes in heaven are.
Hell could not possibly be
how plants eat, how men see --

You demand too much of me,
demand I take off my thinking cap,
demand I pull out my taroc pack.
Can't you be content
with my rose-tinted lens?

O sex, you are a flute duet,
and dreams, they are the flautists.

I am bathing naked in a stream,
my long hair (for my hair is long,
the air about my neck is how I hide it)
flowing freely with the fishes' eggs.

The huntress is stunned. I cannot believe
what stuns her is the song my dreams recall
whose notes she watches dance in vivid air
and land like drops of dew upon her hair.
No, it is lust, red and black -- now

let the two of us mingle
in the water like hot blood
prefers to mingle in the dark,
on black stone, on the arc
that resurrects the night. Let embers

turn to flame, fire
turn to ash! Let the audience
suffer an unresolved chord
until the Liebestod --

O dreams, you are a television screen.

From the distance that is sleep, I watch
the old conclusion: Hippomenes winning Atalanta
with golden apples gifted by a goddess.
I cry out: do not forget! do not forget!

But the pyres remain unlit
and the show goes on as written.
In Cybele's temple, they elope,
and in Cybele's temple, Ovid sings
another song of metamorphosis,

egress. The curtain falls. Static
fills the signal. The lesson
sticks out: for us

exceptional beasts,
childhood must end cold.
 
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