On the Eve of Divorce

You, tiny you.
Sweet, fat nephew.
Milk slips to your chin and you
shuffle me, make me snuggly,
your elbows and fists
kneading
like insistent kitten mittens.

You and me, we are We;
struggling, in the folds of dark,
blinking, peeping.
Stunned bats.
Cane chair criss-crosses
litter my arms and I cringe
but don't shift.

As you fight sleep
I twist kiss curls
'round my ring finger and weep.

Life is about to run into this room,
put on the mask of your parents,
grab your small skull
and dash it on the walls,
goring the beach balls, teddy bears

and all the years unspun.

Culvert Space

I meditate the road above;
a humble coat of needles for a cushion.
Cached, supine, by ragged boughs.
The broken willows are in careless piles -
last month's collection by windy fingers.

I wonder at the cool of this shade;
a full fathom less than
April's throttling white light.

Hidden eyes slide around
the highway fliers, tasting their speed.
I dig fingers in their brains to find
where and why they speed away.

Then, flash!
My prying stare cracks.
A formation of bold wrens wheels and
turns like a mass of mad barons
and I spill backwards, blanching.

Their chests are tooth ivory, their wings:
perfect charcoal points.

Brachia

I chose this arm for you.
Woman, you married it.
A small party of priests
marked the gift
and pushed you forward,
stumbling
to grasp the blueing fingers.
I pushed a scalpel in for measure
(the sinew should tear
upon inauguration,
right on dotted lines).
Ah, woman, such contrition.
You will adore
the sound!
A rotten chicken wing cracking
from a scared breast.

Caveat emptor!
What for, this remorse?
Did you not practice your steps
daily
just like I told you?
What, what, your survival kit
of cliches, pulp and Bible
are in the bottom drawer?
Well, what can you ask for?
You are all tears and apple cores
and bitten bitter mouth.

Little woman, come now.
Convention is a confection
if you know how to wash it down.

Panic

Manic panic is
punching through a canvas
that is painted with my fists.
There are mirrors singing of mirrors
and all eyes are on
the kaleidoscope girl who shifts
in and out of frame.

Go on, gulp and tug
with butterhands at the hem.
You can, if you try, you can hide
the hem of your lie.
They won't know
They won't know
They won't guess at all
That the working fracture
conceals a leopard.

Twilight

Finally, twilight comes.

Days of icicles and gags
have seized my jelly heart into
a tough, belligerent bloc.

Now I can't hear you.
Your cajoling insight
and loveless legalese is useless
against the pendulum swing
of sleep.

Judiciously it falls
to knock your hands
from 'round my throat.