Like, Don’t you want a little light in your belly?

Like the way Orion and Scorpius—

across all that black night—pass the sun.

My brother loosens his mouth—

between his teeth, throbbing red Antares.

One way to open a body to the stars, with a knife.

One way to love a sister, help her bleed light.

These Hands, If Not Gods

Haven’t they moved like rivers—

like glory, like light—

over the seven days of your body?

And wasn’t that good?

Them at your hips—

isn’t this what God felt when he pressed together

the first Beloved: Everything.

Fever. Vapor. Atman. Pulsus.

Finally, a sin worth hurting for, a fervor,

a sweet—You are mine.

It is hard not to have faith in this:

from the blue-brown clay of night

these two potters crushed and smoothed you

into being—grind, then curve—built your form up—

atlas of bone, fields of muscle,

one breast a fig tree, the other a nightingale,

both morning and evening.

O, the beautiful making they do,

of trigger and carve, suffering and stars.

Aren’t they, too, the carpenters

of your small church? Have they not burned

on the altar of your belly, eaten the bread

of your thighs, broke you to wine, to ichor,

to nectareous feast?

Haven’t they riveted your wrists, haven’t they

had you at your knees?

And when these hands touched your throat,

showed you how to take the apple and the rib,

how to slip a thumb into your mouth and taste it all,

didn’t you sing out their ninety-nine names—

Zahir, Aleph, hands-times-seven,

Sphinx, Leonids, locomotura,

Rubidium, August, and September—

and when you cried out, O, Prometheans,

didn’t they bring fire?

These hands, if not gods, then why

when you have come to me, and I have returned you

to that from which you came—white mud, mica, mineral, salt—

why then do you whisper, O, my Hecatonchire. My Centimani.

My Hundred-Handed One?

Catching Copper

My brothers have

a bullet.

They keep their bullet

on a leash shiny

as a whip of blood.

My brothers walk their bullet

with a limp—a clipped

hip bone.

My brothers’ bullet

is a math-head, is all geometry,

from a distance is just a bee

and its sting. Like a bee—

you should see my brothers’ bullet

make a comb, by chewing holes

in what is sweet.

My brothers lose

their bullet all the time—

when their bullet takes off on them,

their bullet leaves a hole.

My brothers search their houses,

their bodies for their bullet,

and a little red ghost moans.

Eventually, my brothers call out,

Here, bullet, here—

their bullet comes running, buzzing.

Their bullet always comes

back to them. When their bullet comes

back to them, their bullet

leaves a hole.

My brothers are too slow

for their bullet

because their bullet is in a hurry

and wants to get the lead out.

My brothers’ bullet is dressed

for a red carpet

in a copper jacket.

My brothers tell their bullet,

Careful you don’t hurt somebody