Old Nightmares

Where the fairground used to be.
Night's necklace of globed colours
swinging in salt breeze; lovers,
car-lovers, shy couples blinking
at the carny, shifting weight,
the shuffle of Grosbys in the grit,
sweat-stained change fingered
in pockets, chiko-rolls and chips.

Always a lost child
restored to the begetters
with a melted liquid face
red as sunburn, sunset;
the saline channels follow
gravity's chaotic chance-path
down soft planes of skin,
wash the way for and seed
the later map of wrinkles.

Trinkets hardly worth the eye
and arm-throw, let alone the dollar
are clutched as trophies;
in the other hand the big hand
that holds safe animal warmth
and almost defeats the string
of bright spots, the rider's screams.

Flu Season

There were no wars at the start.
Cabbages abounded.
They took place behind closed doors
in the dark
I envied Eggers his obviousness
avoided The Da Vinci Code
all xmas, hunkered down
is such an american word.
I don't doubt it.
The air grew recompense.
We grow up by accident.
I was such a good swimmer
before I was born,
I don't know what happened.
I thirsted for an indigent bark,
a corkscrew -I had to use my hands
- the wine was bad, french,
like the movie Brazil but more so.
I nodded off
the most stimulating night
I've ever had,
woke miles from friends,
a bathroom.
(I never set foot
on a true path
that didn't / coexist
with nothing much.)
I envisaged, as they say,
a different sort of tidal mapping,
something done with the growth
rings of eggplants. Birds embarked
at that -their purplish hue,
imbedded direction-
a dog coughed.
I covered the dish
of half-hearted ham fists
you'd left on the counter
counted the hairs of your return;
I coveted their volume
& no doubt I courted disaster
but it was such a good dancer
(innumerable fears of loneliness
are so much phlegm.)
I eschewed reality but grew
increasingly fond
of realism until
while misreading McCarthy
I sent my wet thoughts
up the chimney the ceiling
the unfeeling smoke detector
(wherein lies your heart)
and let go of love of longing
of trying to be well.
(That's mine. You can't even
look at it unless I say yes.)