Buddha says fire, fire, put out the fire!

Everything burns here,

but not like Buddha says:

not from a fire-hoop around the head

where the flames point in.

Rather, flames take

the shapes of hammers and nails and lumber

around the burning things.

The new day is slid underneath

the old days:

The clouds can hear only themselves,

the wind can hear only itself,

the old sky grows dark and idiotic, and becomes heaven,

the sun wrenches itself open:

Babylon before Eden,

orchard before garden,

our variety before variety,

shame before shame-knowledge:

When shame was an entity

wandering even from the body

into the tea,

into the brass doves,

into this autobiographical moment.

I must take full responsibility. Quite right. I will move on.

Universe Where We Weren’t Artists

UNIVERSE WHERE WE WEREN’T ARTISTS

I am given a reward:

You two will pick

where I rest.

We are three sweet hunters gazing

at the fat-soaked bog.

Down each gun-hole

we seek the glass lens

that would explode the image

of our prey.

A cuff of air.

We look up to

the hilarious moon.

I fall down in white mud.

When the breath starts to be ragged,

tickle me, my deepest beloveds—

so that the raggedness becomes confused.

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments