The mind is swarmed 
with useless 
degrees and warm with lazy
sleeping in on facts. Mom’s sick, sicking

by the day. I could feel better but I won’t.
Solidarity the two of us in one boat
 
that relies on Jack now,
the second born-hope
though I am sneaky and I happen to know
he
sinks
in
vodka
 
laden with loans I showed how to borrow
from the rent’s headache cabinet. Tomorrow
 
I will pretend to have forgotten.
He’s halving grapefruits, they disappear
 
rind - first in the juicer, the metal rotten
with rotten bits. Overhear
him crying & miss him though he is still here.

LA. thigh-backs are sun-fucked on sidewalks
I lumbering promising delaying detox
til I’m needless. but paradox panic habits her soapbox
 
so fling my rag doll body, surrender
to airplane. go home. mom is dead, blank, defend her
(from me) the cruel soul. my body means well: she is my lender.
 
I will lose sight of both ends of this week
regardless of promises to get better. you freak
mom out, body daughter agrees. resign. our flight is complete.
 

here. caught in a rainstorm in my tent.
sat. morn. feasted on pancakes with friends.
 
here. sated w/ syrup fried pancake love.
sensing lyrics beyond language
in the groans from above:
 
thunder rolls over, a marble down
stairs. plink-plop rhythm gifted as sound
 
here. I think I am waking up, slow.
I feel waves, which mom & rain wrote. me
too. its origins I do not know.

release my hand. at the museum
paint and my face square up three inches
from security-guard threesomes.
 
I dive into paint-pond gobbed w/ lilies
you vacuum walls, eyes gelatinous
green. us glow. warming transparent cities
 
with giddy and luck, blinding and blind.
at night we walk. tiptoe wharfs. if only
you were real. not a fluke in my mind.
 

stump: let’s make a blood pact.
let’s together get blown over
by our best friend, wind. no lack
of oatmeal or ritual hangovers
has set me looking, but tomorrow the project of my life blimps away.
you are (five hundred years bent) content, I won't stay. 

rememory me, stump. use my blood which is nimble
nimbler than words, feeble transmutations of your patience to symbol.
Let’s steal time again, pact.
Soon nothing will be shared like that.  
I’ve chosen my tin can
when forever is over let’s mix formats
and we’ll sprout from the same dirty hand.

Fell asleep at 9am now I 
Am blooded sugar, 
Mouth musty off chocolates stolen
with sweaty palms
Under purple, disapproval, 
Half-moon eyes, the cashier. Fuck her
Nowhere to go and nothing
To smoke. Pick at nails
Whorled. Like conches 
J wants to be alone. 
M napping. Can’t find O
(didn’t look). 
I’m not a tourist don’t look at me. 
Just tired of breathing
Out sour tubes, panting in the
White sun watch the flowers 
Across the street they 
Wary and 
Big eyed and 
don’t move

time for sleep for I 
have emptied behind my 
eyes and soon it will 
be smooth enough to 
roast an egg upon my forehead.

I
 
I saw the end.
Enter
my Eyeball. Perched on ore mound clogged with
Arteries older than the first woman’s back teeth.  
Are you forgetting her? Listen, she is a noisy chewer.
Feaster of stray bones from dead dogs, and licker
Of blooming green hallucinogenic moss.
Crumbling from her uncombed braids
Some good dirt.
 
II
 
I heard the beginning.
The first Mountain told that
The first woman bore herself from the lethal waters of oblivion.
He rose and bowed to her, and as she grew strong
He grew old; wretched ice storms ripped his face
To loose pebbles which fell at the feet of her daughters.
She left them behind.
 
 
III
 
I am the middle.
My body once empty will feed
The mountain an inch.
He will rise and
He will fall. He is already sand under the quaking aspens-
Father of lovers who carve initials.
I carve here too, I am their child, Nobody.
 

nobody’s fault but dinner is over.
my fellows and their inner plans slain.
prince twilight nearly botches a hostile takeover
releasing the shades from his father’s domain.
 
a plate recedes to clinking noise
my friend’s eye, a folded flab.
earnest, they thank the shy convoy,
sleep. I stay with my body, trapped.

this ancient barbed fence;
these million bobbing heads:
wheat greeting the crow as he caws.

applause of thick oak boughs
roiling before blue mouth
south of baptism, the mineral sea.
 
trees in twos, patient like parents
pursue communion which merits
mentioning it’s me them then I
 
swapping breath. We (lacquered leaves) discuss  
the diaphanous girl, gently gleaned from above
until enough and I retreat to her diameter, skull.