haiku

tides tug at my hips
like your sudden, insistent
hands hold back the moon.

topography (2).

say you can't believe in the miracle
of body. say anger, when
what you mean is fear.
say you are shaken, say disaster
is the one constant you cannot
escape any other way. litany after
litany - as though the rhythm
of breath is somehow disparate
from the rhythm of drums.

caesura.

just once: a moment
in which time
cannot catch us.

a pause, which by its
nature indicates
that these heartbeats,

these intakes of breath
do not deduct from
whatever our final tally
turns out to be.

practicality.

i am not clever enough
to invent a new and exciting
metaphor for loving you -
for this music we make,

so instead let me tell you stories
about jazz, about all the

improvisation

promised by storied hips
and soft half-moans or were they
moons like apples
with a bite already gone

i can tell you of violins,
of muscles stretched taut
against the strings,

bodies bent into instruments
until one becomes the other
and they both become fire.

wildlife.

Snake with foot found in China.


Man-eating bird.


Pink grasshopper.


Mountain Goats.

topography.

the study of landforms at any scale
no more two-dimensional representations
the surface shape
only hinting at the
broader meaning
(depth)
(how much we keep hidden
below sea level)
so much
less common