Garmi

It’s still too hot (though it’s night)

and the air fights us as we breathe it.

We thought the dark would issue

relief from this closeness, but

heat is trapped inside our walls all day where

things are harder to change.  Out in the open, the animals

sigh and give thanks under the smiles of indulgent stars while we lie here blank and

praying for sleep.

We know dreams come when they decide to–not a moment before–so,

in the meantime,

we

try to make peace with the sweat that balances on our upper lip

as something meant to help us.

And when the fan sends clumsy air over naked legs, we stare back into the black, blinking

and

thinking

of

India.

Hill Station

Out on the balcony, she could see the lake

of course

and beyond it the jagged green foothills with chalk colored houses

clinging to them.

And the lake wore a steel sheet–sometimes–if hanging clouds were heavy,

or sometimes it looked cheap because of the bobbing crisp bags.

If she looked out and up, never letting her eyes follow the shouts of the Rag Wallah on the

street

below, she could

pretend that this place was paradise, she could

not see

the old woman pick through the trash bin for

breakfast.

Habit

The light had not soaked through yet, was still lingering underneath reality,

and the covers were a kind of love around her neck.

They were warm in the places where life had lain,

and cool in others, like certain surprises in the ocean.

And her legs were divers without their suits, without their air, without their bravery,

because they only searched the silky known for things they’d already found.

Traveling Mercies

“Do not believe every spirit,” the man said.

“Some whisper shadow things that lace the muscles tight between the blades

so you curve backward,

so you look at the sun and stop seeing.

Don’t believe every spirit.

Some whisper gentle things so you won’t look down, so that

a silent shard splits your flesh and

you can’t walk your road.

Don’t believe.

Some murmur spiritual things so that you feel them

in your belly, so that

you don’t know which way to go, so that you always look behind you.

Don’t.”

Internet

Talk

Cross talk

Sink

Soak

Rebound

Repeat

Holler

Hush

Listen

Learn

Love

Live

The Witness

Baptize my brain so that

I do not remember what I’ve seen.

Or,

if not that,

give me glasses to spread

the weeping fog that clings.

But if you will not do that, then

give me iron so that my back is straight

and my shoulders able

to bear what cannot be forgotten.

Rudy

Little patched dog who sits wonky in the weeds,

who settles his haunches cool,

is what love looks like when there are

no memories to speak of.

He smiles–can a dog smile?–but

he does, stretches his black rubber lips

and shows us his smooth side teeth, lets his tongue

spill generously, a

happy bubblegum waterfall.

He’s young and doesn’t yet know that life

is a hard maybe, and

when he winks at us through copper lashes,

we’re hopeful

that he never will.

The End

The earth is a wad of paper with color in its folds,

and it sways,

suspended, swinging,

over orange heat.

Yet you are not slow, as some count slowness.

Sometimes I think it descends even lower so that

the temperature spikes us, and we are like storks,

switching legs from the burn.

But then

a cool wind milks over blistered skins, and time stretches itself out.

Yet you are not slow, as some count slowness.

And I say to myself, ‘If this place is going to catch

and shrink in hellish blue, it

should go ahead

and do it.’

But it keeps swinging for now, with all of us holding on,

until the fullness of time.

Because

you are not slow,

as some

count

slowness.

John the Baptizer

You stood in the burning sand, and yelled until you were hoarse.

You said, ‘Make way for the King!’ and I knew you were right.

I was listening, you know, though my feet were burning, too.

And I wanted to dig him out a path, felt afraid not to, because sometimes you see

how things will turn out.

But I didn’t.

Instead I watched a fly languish in the heat coming off your hair. I thought that your dreds must smell like

moldy wheat because of the sun.

And I stayed where I was

till I forgot I could move.

It’s not too late, is it, though you shooed us away for the evening?

Because I want to make way, now, because I’m ready.