know your enemy

long in the quicksilver know your enemy
clings wetly to your bones know your enemy
shouts slurs in dark corners know your enemy
would if they could know your enemy

most virtuous most despicable know your enemy
crawlspaced bodies pigeonhold know your enemy
whose cloak of invisibility screams and screams know your enemy
under eye ink pools know your enemy

the accuser is: know your enemy

neardistant

behind
shocking wave en
jambed it lives allatonce
neardistant

bowed
tied up real nice & set adrift
sea’s aspersions
waves hello

today’s rent due 10 years ago
same block but crumpled
but creased (who
laughed?)

2018 / 2008
nothing between friends
who anyways just sort of fade
neardistant


Deep Calls

such warmth that grin which
i’d’ve butlered cloched quick-as-you-like

drips instead drops instead down
a narrow mineshaft

no ladder built to follow
no chain no bucket

lies strewn amidst unsailable scraps
stationary gemless

a flashbulbed minute tethered
in amber plunged

copper-wrapped its thrumming core
calls deep unto deep

& you shall
& you must

thatsnotme

child with mud in its ears
thesaurus for mouth
that’s not me

sinner with fingers in
pies pies pies pies pies
that’s not me

fool suburban
nothing to do nothing to see
that’s not me

what i am is an excuse
for myself

what i am doing is what
must be done

where i go is where i am
right
now

whatever you must say

it says
at the end of a sentence a period

as always it is wrong
cause

what if the sentence need never end instead goes on
on into an enjambed

future hazy disorienting
also forever

it says
must say fewer

wrong as always
you must say

whatever you must say
no less

15 Minutes Away And I Don’t

Some memory of you
And the way you used to talk
Your mouth feared what it could say

A spare thought shifts
The stacks

Stands still
And what was I doing

You take my picture and I take yours
Somewhere a photograph
Meaningless still

Crooked teeth
Golden fur

In a sleeping bag half-in-half-out of your room
I dream big dreams

(They won’t come true)

Braved the 403 so many hours
I wouldn’t anymore

I’m 15 minutes away
And I don’t

this isn’t me

this isn’t me

moving through the world
walking through waste deep mud always

this isn’t me

sweating in the summer sun
breathing heavy resting against some oak or

this isn’t me

in the booth pouring it out
to silence

this isn’t me

at mirrors somewhere me stares out
who is the head-me the thought-me

that isn’t me

but is

Bail

They say, We reject these stones

A ways off builders continue to
Slap wet mortar, hails and
Hallows in shared
Enterprise

As always, Turn windward or away

Sepulchres need whitewashing
Buttresses need buttresses
Trenches fill with water

Accusing, Grab a bucket or
bail

end to end

give each bird a name
lest

forgetful seeps underdoor
before open eyes

recite
each
one

whose name skipped
from sky falls

& other lies
whose invented name

is nothing
whose peckish e major
is nothing
whose latin anatomy
is nothing

you who lay end to end letters
lay top to bottom names

lay & do invent
ory