If You Love Me, Take Me To Grooveland*

Set forth into
this miserable little
drama

we cast about
for that beautiful thing
that we can kill


in order to secure our fame


*James Brown

How to Wake Up

In the land of two-headed men
a two-headed man heads
down the road

a road from which
return is
uncertain




the choice is made for
which head to choose?
Too precious things -
in choosing one,




will both be lost?

Cat

In an estate of silence
in a kingdom of true believers
as if to leave a space to write
a name

A choice gets made,
a space is left blank,
leave it silent again.

Cadeaux

The biggest hair i ever saw
was on a girl from
Saginaw

The biggest hands in all the land
are on a man from
Samarkand

But the biggest feet i ever seen
is on a kid from
Cuperteen-

(oh)

How to Make Noise

The moments that come along.
Some bleeding stars.
The long night.
The watching,
breathing.

A vapor trail
across the morning paper.

(you know what I'm doing- you see right through me.)

The organ of knowing.
A mental interrogation.
Himmler's dog.

A scratchy shirt.
A screech in the wilderness.

Your head under water.

Eternal Bliss.

Radio Silence

Go figure.
I am not truly honest
especially about myself
except to myself.
This makes me a confidence-man

It looks as if I'd
been there
and seen all the names
printed on your wall
and taken some outward treasure
from your hand (you gave it willingly)

And all those names are names
of them you left wanting,
perfectly matching your
dark-stained vision.

America

Inside the dream
there is something I borrowed but forgot to repay. In
a land of modest means
this means, of course, you win.

No explanation is useful for how the sides
turn themselves inside out
like binary stars at the singularity

how to go on, now.

the flying birds and tumbling trees tremble at
the distant rumbling from the sky. Both touch it,

but neither is of it, really.

Uncertainty

At rest at once among the flowing moments
the stream's pace now quick'ning forward
to some sort of reckoning
is this the peace we dreamt of?

A mouthpiece mirror opens and closes
like a fish on the beach at once comical
and tragic- seeing into the future.

What else is artificial darkness but a fragile light?

Say

OK- say the word, inserted:
the you understood
the dreaming, unknown deed-
time in Paradise.

The word is omitted
then reinstated.
(It relieves much embarassment.)
The Prophet is pleased.
We must destroy ourselves to save ourselves.

Slumper

Note to the disposable self:
not as a bird through Bede's winter Hall
to find yourself waiting for
the sound of a touch.

This is not to say that
you will know from where the bird came
and to where it will go.

Collapse

Across the sane world
two plus two may be five
at least this is what you will tell your inquisitor

(if this is what he wants to know)

Urinators!
we are defeated by our refusal to reason
by our shock in the face of the absurd.

(The camps will soon be open.)

Collider

the exceptional velocity of lies
cradles within it a certain exhiliration
when left alone destroys all doubt

When brought into the light
is the prologue to ruin

October and all these failed birds.