Book of Sand
I sleep with my shoes on and my teeth singing a jar
conjugate the world’s verbs in the throat of a wolf
hang the trees upside down like winter garlic for a miscreant
buckle the boots of the tense long-ago Winter for Spring
win over the wind with a bribe licked up from the floor up color
drive down a dusty road of lost bodies clacking along the curves
steal love in the tint of stranger’s eyes
stalk the silhouette wading far into the sea
shadow words caught in the throat of a tarpon, ill and nongrammatical
scuttle up the dark recess of bramble and cave hunger on a city corner
light spiders out the door into the forest in columns
allow the moon to thread through the doorkeep’s passage
silver ants outward and over the branch hanging
as the soup curdles and rhymes ran out the door
is this all that is left in aging limbs as I linger
breath’s life into the dead in thimbles
as you
carve constellations into the chest of the sky
wake the bronze river with fur, fire and mahogany
pull back the covers of your tattoos to traduce a new cliche
imagine what leaves in a cake on the platform of the station
a black backpack of tenderness bulging in a locker
as the stars drop away in twos and threes
while alone in the train disappearance catches you wondering
are you afraid to gamble the bones in the bag left at your feet, or else
where would the world be without you
as the stories dismount slowly from a beekeeper’s gloves
and the wolf stepped through the door
