Splendor In The Grass Glory In The Flower

"The Tree"

it is a mark of

our poverty

that we flee the act of

placing words on this here this earthly emanating goldly skyward

fearing too many tropes have stuck on it

glue-like

how many layers

since that earliest sin-filled garden tale

by now it is the world’s thickest palimpsest

so what should we do this autumn morning

chill licking our fingers ears

and camera shutter barely clicking

as we see

its sharp intensity

bending our sense

of what today

is new

"In The Land Without Adjectives"

in the fall the King

parsimonious

forbade all adjectives from

attaching

to any stone or growing flowing thing



henceforth

the grove had to own the shade or hue

could not be it

or seem

and you

also could not slide

thoughtlessly into that nuance so much fancied then

but had

to swallow quick

and say

I

clasp

now

 it

"Which Of These Scrambled Words"

which of these scrambled words is least like the others

burbles the airplane magazine game page

do you mean

which of the words is least like anything at all

which of them is variously floating

there

in mind space

black chemical ink on cellulose fiber with a light slick coating

so that the printed airline logo gleams

at 32,000 feet

while that particular word over there

and this one over here

actually those physical objects

of black and cellulose

are hurtling along with us and our steel tube

trying to attain our spot of desire

what would be these words’ desires I wonder

do they even have them

basically squiggles impressed on the page

no meaning at all

if you come from Cefalu

and are being accustomed

to different squiggles entirely

the meaning

whatever it is

seems to be a link

kind of like an electric arc

from our mind

to the squiggle

these two things are glued together spiritwise

and that spirit-glue

is also

hurtling

along with us

at one hundred kilometers per minute

to Miami International Airport

"You Just Can't Get Some Things"

you just can’t get some things sometimes

or sometimes any time

eluding us

they lie in their homes

in their home lands

when we write their latitudes and longitudes

the digits slide off the page

nests of sapphires rubies emeralds opalines

shaded far away

by acanthus leaves

washed by what seem to us inchoate speaking airs

tongues lavishing unintelligible complexities

on their ellipsoid shapes

you

here

you go into a store shopping bag in hand

looking over the rutabagas and such

loaves of bread made of grains and sand

blended with a bit of water and thirst

exiting

you feel

vaguely absent

not quite forlorn

is this what we were made for?