air – other animals

my burning eyes how do I escape from
I and all this time in circles
not wanting to make punchlines or
origami and the balloon
losing air we could have put to some use

my hand sways a rhyme in cursive air above the first bluet

(First published in Under the Basho.)

as I write with one foot
stuck in dark mud the other

unresponsive for reasons
I can’t discover lights

flicker throughout the day I’m
more full of fewer thoughts with

air enough for me to ascend
the brilliant sharp mountain

I have kept my pockets empty for
I have kept my back straight against through

years of small work and I
see the check on its way

before I’ve ordered it’s my fault
I should have gotten here as soon as

the neighbors finished dancing
on our ceiling and the sky

changed to business casual blue so with
my knuckles sore I crack another nut

but what if one thought survives
somehow the pressure of space

as the small stones crawl from the sea
wall after the grey is gone

and we work into the overhyped
night sponsored by what you would rather

remember a castle visited
through a dream that always asks too much

morning escapes
through newly empty air
acorns

those early days under the sea when we went from five eyes to three to just the pair and slowly painfully learned to breathe the poison air

the air going out of my best-made delusion I so wanted to see grow up and take its place in the museum of medical atrocities