there’s simply no way to write
without laying waste to all of existence
in order to choose
what to bring back from the dust of all this —
is this what is called the word incarnate?
in the narrow game
the word throbs with special meaning
and degradation
the trench between thought and truth
always fills unfordable
with wastewaters
of the selfhood machines
***
green good empty in her hands
like the lowdown moon melted into a dead leaf
and gave up on its majesty for absence
even if imagery
there’s not a thing I know
that won’t destroy her bit by bit
while her dreams drum into big distance
we might call this society and nothingness
and it hurts like hell
***
could emerald gate
unheralded unhealed as yet
invisible naked in the eye of eyes?
there’s the labyrinth’s bored door
awake like any story or catastrophe
that we can design from the skin
we lay over the monster
to name it fear after our mothers’ love
and pray to it
this is called cosmic joke
to eat an empty banquet of journeys
in the neutered night of yawning heroes
never lost in the dignified sense
***
couple billion years since
we swam before pestered by knowing
a million ways to die alone
a thousand ways to hurry the days
we decided to call this moving forward
even so
progress was a sad discussion
had sat unsatisfied in the always garden
everywhere nowhen
remember then?
caretaking chaos
waymaking in formlessness —
only nod to that cowboy
when you can tell his horse adores him
***
there’s nothing natural
nothing supernatural or superficial
nothing rural or urban
or progressive or fascist
nothing sly or truthful
or happy or empty
nothing mystical nothing mundane
nowhere to hide or to be seen
there’s not a single reason
to dance
or to sit it out
someone named this absurd freedom
a kind of soulless slogan
a godless jingle
a crass catchphrase
a snickering little comeback —
if we could just wield
the rainbowed silences of the snowfall
like a prayerful language
then we could say what we mean