re-addressing a chinese pianist

these hands of mine crawl keys—
two hairless tarantulas
caught in the beaks of her frenzied flamingos
how fine
her powdered neck
her lilac sash and purple dress
she is now a woman
and i a boy with sweaty palms
she places her fingers on top of mine
like this you ignorant child
her breath is hot against my ear
we are flying again
high above
the broken chord

a chinese pianist

in purple gown and lilac sash
she flits her fingers over keys
and stoops her head and teeters
everything is birds and feathers
the way she lifts her wrists and elbows
the necks of two flamingos
the room wells with etudes
the bench has toppled
her feet lift from the floor
she flies away
and takes me with her
far beyond
this broken day

Overcoming Darkness

There, above the frozen ruts of mud,
just beyond the leafless heights of aspen,
a thin luminescent smile of Moon
held within the circle of its own ghost,
and right beside it Venus burns
with piercing shards of shattered light. 

Object Lesson

Take some graph paper
and a No. 2 pencil
draw four lines of equal length
two inches each at right angles
and you will have a square
that occupies sixty four grids.
Choose three corners,
at each one draw a line
one and a half inches long
running off in the same direction
at a forty five degree angle.
Connect the ends of each line
with two more lines.
Thus is the illusion of depth obtained
and you can imagine a solid cube,
or a volume containing nothing,
or less than nothing,
merely the idea of nothing,
but as you can see
the idea of nothing
is already more than nothing—
this is just the first paradox of love.

place

i’ve never quite grasped the confines of geography
those rivers and valleys those highways between us
why are these cities we live in not spelled the same way
why do our streets have so many different names
where among all the doors in this world is that one door
the only door open to me   your door
that sole door-frame standing between us
the one adorned with postcards
from all the world’s places