Beneath the Milky Green Sun
ii
allow the finite stars to spit, cascading
allow your hands to finger calculations spread on the floor as dough
pasteurize translations on the damp body with soap
rim the bathtub as both coffin and consolation, the caulk names
diary the self meandering over marauding cracks
let in the damp and the overused as your name sounds unfamiliar on the train
submarine the expanse bowed beneath the bookcase’s belly
she taught you that while alive you were stitch blessing and bankruptcy
“The imaginative dust piles twice as long as your lecture” she once wrote
“Twice I returned from a finite shore”
“Thrice I ventured the green light,”
what have you done, young man
the distance no fun at all when we paddled toward the indistinct in our mind
did we wade long alone when the tide turned toward us
did we pick up our clothes on the river shore or let them only linger under the sun
did we run away, or forget epileptic?
author's note: this is the second part of a three-part poem sequence and the last part will be published next week
