Heaven Dog
What fruits
there are in Hell—and has
any 1 wandered about them
? The very few things
as true as blood: who named
and who counted them ?
Granted, if the parvovirus takes our
dog of 9 months. Exclamations
Vary. The play of fur, innocent
tongue pink flesh and flame
In summer. Rust of grief. Saltpeter
For growing absence, the riptide
Sorrow. Solo flight. The moon howled
At. Pedigree pellets shaped into
Tiny bones of cartoon anatomy.
More than dogs, than nuptial gods.
Time in a wedding chamber—elastic
Hymen snaps a glow-worm’s green-blue
Touch. Incandescent moan. Crux.
Labial cheek. Horse-hair brush.
Heirloom wood handle. No you say
Yes you say there are words
But how do they mean ?
? Greater love hath no man
or dog than this—a life laid
Down—in memory, in a heart
Torn recklessly—in blinding
Storm—hammer fist, loss, madness.
Or prayer flung in the deadly
Dark—what is man/what is dog.
The playground of a killing love.
(For Cotton)
Sophia’s Rules For Ghosts
They can’t come in the house, Daddy. The door is
Locked. Where do they live?
In the land of ghosts. Well, how come we see them?
Sometimes they get lost and end up here where we are.
Or maybe they take vacations. All right, maybe they
Take vacations.
When we see them, could we set them on fire so they die?
Ghosts can’t die, honey. They’re already dead.
Of course they can die if we throw a big bomb at them. They
Explode into little pieces and they’re gone.
I’ve never bombed any ghost before so I don’t know.
Are you afraid of ghosts? Only of the ones I don’t see. The ones
I do see are here and gone very quickly.
You’re right. They’re more scary in the shadows.
I loved her at that very moment. In her smallness and her tiny
Certainties. I took her in my arms and then
I went right through her.
What It’s Like
what’s it like to have a god?
the chinese lady asked me
growing up in the mainland,
and, godless
done well for herself
moved to the u.s.
married an american
living in new york
firmly in the k(now)
her question’s no different, i guess,
from what her own grandfather
wondered about:
grown up and old in the mainland
surrounded by mountains, asking
what is the sea like?
my grandfather asked that of
relatives, of strangers passing by
she said, my grandfather was too poor,
too weak to go seaward
he died, never having seen the sea
the ocean would have frightened him
her question and the old man’s are not
much different
and the ending, if, the same, is enough
for any life
a life that wondered; that desired
sea or god,
which one would have cared?