from Fair bodies of unseen prose,

 

, point you toward the entrance of a house or a jagged stone wall.

How close we are. Surfaces. The difference of clocks. Shoulders, curved in the light. In which blood flows. And from this day, earth. All electrons. I begun my education with redundancies. Pattern recognition, charred residue. Sequels, reboot. Recalculating. Inverted time, a cramped bed for two. My own disruptiveness. Absolute integrity. Words, itch. Noisily. To talk against wishes, false in the mouth. Repetitions. Walk, a bit. The water’s edge. Doomed, to consequence. Into the air. This sparkling mist.

 

, or locked away in the nonsense of lungs.

Slated, never in our selves. The missing stone, water. Determining practice. You do not wish to change geometry. Is there love on Mars? Am I unavailable? The way a beat so casually, drops. The temperature, across red sands. The moon’s influence. How intrepid. The ear, you lend. Be clear about instructions, what. Or flows, a fortress. Tears. My only elsewhere.

 

We are relational forms unseen, linings becoming more porous with time.

How visible, this song of words. How rational, relational. Row upon, the body’s memory. This mishmash, practice. This loss, arising. To disrupt weather patterns. No sound is, less. A logical objection. One wishes to outlive. I descend some steps.

 

Rose finally gets a fish

 

1.

Her months of drawings, pressure                   ; reminders
to our whispered ears, to

plastering the fridge with several clones

of her single magnet-held artwork: “fish,” she writes, above
each sketch of same, “I want one.” I, for one,

hesitate to introduce a new character

into this household menagerie, with the increased risk
of cancelling the whole business. Richie’s brother Chuck

from Happy Days’ first season, or to simply

jump the shark.

 

2.

She wants a fish.                      Demands: a pet of her own,
to share with younger sister,

since I refuse to entertain a dog           ; our cat
would tarnish, and my difficulty with lack

of unaccompanied urban territory. A dog

requires an excess                    unavailable. I originated
from a farm                 , after all, where dogs

possess the amplitude
to roam.                       Preferring, also, not

a defecated yard. Rose              wants a fish, she
wants a fish, she wants a fish. In case

the message was unclear. She offers
promises of pet care and routine,

hoping someone will believe her.

 

3.

Bellwether, prep; to establish and assemble her aquarium

before any fish might land. Rose plucks

a castle, mermaid                     , small plastic greenery; harvests
two small bags of coloured gravel. Her bearing, shifts,

she vibrates, crosswise; strums                         PetSmart shelves.
Each step

a stop, a break                          in linearity. She laughs,

ahead of her own debate. With fresh tank sidelining
her seasonal e-learning retreat

of former dining room, she holds: the soon-keeper

of the sacred fish.

 

4.

This biological                         filter media. Her fishless
ten-gallon vessel, which will be,

soon enough. How water catches sound
in motion, motion. Apparently boundless. This approximation

of a single misstep, stanza,

verset, word. Once home, and set                    , she stares, across

this dimpled glow                    of light-emitting diode
into oxygenating water.

 

 

from Fair bodies of unseen prose,

 

A comfortable place in the unconscious

Can one dream while lying awake? This proximity of cloud. Consensus, the end of parenthetical. Draws curtains, threat. This pragmatism: my mother gave birth to it. Melancholy, melancholy. Ask anything you want. What measure, propositions. Withdraw. Jolting, epiphanic effect. This sentence, shadows; these missives on death. Slammed door, sliver lining. Declarative: I would have liked to move the earth. Imagine, the desire for mute prose. Liquid. This body or death. This end of text.