poetry

            Hip swagger,black coat,bellyful of kittens—             sun-shadow brume of chimney-ash dander—tightrope-walking fencesthat lean like drunks beyond the water’s edge,             crooked, corroding—salt-battered,wind-battered, time-             battered thingsthat keep exactly nothing at bay—queens of the things that make our acquaintance,             masters of that which allowus command. The block, a plague-timeferal’s kingdom—backyard plots             & sea grass—Felis catus makes do with specters […]

17, rubbled in his family’s Liège apartment, throat like sawdust, half hoping to die & wondering if he already had. Before that a missile peeled a building, a home, a family away. Before that a V-2 rocket launched from the Baltic made gravity a chump. Before that prisoners hungrier than him welded its casing together.

i.      The Ocean        Gilded crests and metallic prisms        are shattered now, transmuted now:        emerald to tanzanite to sapphire to silver        in accordance with nor’eastern alchemy.        Like birth, the horizon becomes distinct bodies;        you watch as sea splits free from sky.         And there, between—a line across deep water:        an ouroboros loop betwixt past, present, shore.        Serpentine, it ribbons on the backs of swells,        incorporeal and hazed.

Mortals, my father says, come twice before they finally hitthe eternal rest button. By this he meant, a man is to two gravestones,that a man drowned in the slave ship with his dreams, his masterand the sailor can be gifted a chance to own a tomb in the afterlife.That the bodies burnt by a country

She took a dip in the healing watersof Lethe, rubbed the ashes awayuntil her arms were pale and gray with cold. She stepped out, and then began the procession of lotions andlate-night pomegranate trays.Deep breath in. She thinks to herself:The past doesn’t exist exceptfor what its ghost hand has etchedon my body. Breathe out. And

sea girls are wrestling red tigerfish while Margaretgathers upwet bones in a basketwith a howlof wind blowingcicada shadethrough dank and damp cornersof deep-mouthedocean caves her oars dip in and out of shallow water the hot wheezeof hazy, humid daysbreathe inbreathe outthe bathwater tidesroll inroll out sailing by shore, she waves at white skeletons in forced

I My great-grandmother’s house didn’t diewhen she left. They took away her onlyring, the moldy zines, the chairs andcoffee tables she had collectedfrom green rubbish bins.When that failed, they took herghosts as well. II My mother slapped my arm when Itried to press a hand against the wall.It is bad manners to wake a housefrom

the ghost screams twenty-three minutes before your alarmmakes the towels musty dampall the damn timeshe shatters your favorite mugand hides the superglue in the freezerinsists on slamming doors shutand opens all the windows wide in winter lookyou can’t really blame herfor being cranky,a sullen spectral roommatewafting through repainted wallswailing at odd hours you’re in her

take one moment, finely choppedsautée with onion, garlic, an anchovy if you eat fishprepare some bread and butterlet it rest take the next, a piece of cakebroken into piecesstir gently into a glass of winered for chocolate, white for fruit take the third, a fallen leafnot too crispychewed along with a swig from a bottle

  Apollo is stalking again this summer,flaunting his meaty thighs, letting flyhis arrows. Kings summon oracles,ask: Who is the abomination?Whom shall we cast into the wilderness? Heat rolls off our bodies like storms in the desert,but all the pools are cursed. Dive in a woman,come out a monster, leper-lady, bandages unwinding,ringing your little bell. This