2 Poems

after Omori

Today, as yesterday, the tomb-

stones who snuck off into the woods

to escape the chatter of you living

will recline into their leaf-beds.

You drink black coffee so that your end-

points tremble and you can pretend

to be unlike those graves.

Sometimes, presence is a choice.

Even when the day is applebright

over the lake and the sun is nectar

in what remains of the canopy,

you can focus on the algae

molding the water. Mop up

all that sweet amber with a kitchen rag.

That’s your tragic flaw, your hamartia:

You fall for everything

that touches you, but you’ve never loved

a thing that you could touch.

the downy vines make of us willing captives:

couple us to the soybeans:                 blossoms

Pollacking       the field: pure motion:             moths

stir the air’s familiar broth:

then the shotgun

licks its upper lip:                   liberates

a shell that bursts into live cicada:

then thunder     hollers

from behind the tree line:   call:          :response

blue jays croak   a hymn

like a rocker against porchwood:

haint blue:             there’s a grave       on the hill

but it doesn’t move:                content

to keep its distance:

dragonflies remember long-ago verses:

etch their letters between the rows of sorghum:

come:    sit            with us:

taste the storm simmering inside everything

that calls itself a part of this place:

toss a red clay pigeon

just to watch it fly: disappear

into all that green