A Spring Flows Only Sparingly
There was cruelty in the pits there were
Grace notes connoting invisible
Satisfactions there was a cloud
Of purple exhaust glittering with
Fossil flowers & the looming
Silhouettes of yet-to-be evolved birds.
There was a voice sharing certain
Disruptive calculations there were storms
Moaning over the birches wet with fatigue.
What was given was water was pain
Befitting the gods, what was monstrous
Was the pleasure of in-
carnation seeking its student the willing air.
& all around us the snakes
Curled up into ropes of dead
Manna, here where it was
Certain that though less
Than shades we were
Possessed of an amorous &
Annihilating vision.
There was the sheet of white
Paper we fashioned into a universal
Prothesis, there were dogs we kept
Awake with the sounds of Russel
Leibniz Nietzsche, there were roaches
Whose eyes were larger than you’d
Expect & that shined with a chitinous
Affection surpassing description.
& “I” in the hundred grasses was
In simply speaking the aromatic font
Of all image, all light.
& in the music of those
Vapors the color
Of rabbit’s blood the soul in its
Narrowness gave voice to the coming disaster.
I was down, I was lying
Down, I was draining the head
Of reason, I was
In the river myself an open
Mouth a conglomerate
Of wind & glimmering ink.
There was a pearl there was a liquid
Face implied in it, there was a voice
In the wind that by means of the air’s
Chemical music peeled the false
Surface from the day
To release our love.
& all that was needed
At the end of this game
Was for the remaining bars
Of the dream to pursue us
Out of the dark of the summer’s unfastening
Into the flower of the angel’s demands.
There was a violent dream there was a weary head
Advancing,
Red phalanx, cold star,
There was the sigil we’d dubbed “The tongue's advanced
Affections,” & there was the bell
Of a lone trumpet held precariously
Out of the sea