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One death comes
before another.
Breath and smoke.
And smoke which puts out breath.
And silence.

But sometimes only a cigarette
helps you keep your grip. And keeps
its promises more quickly, too.
Between yellowed fingers
it burns like love becomes ashes
like betrayal. Breath and smoke.

The three fingers of oath curved
around the cigarette: to
not forswear.
Giordano burns on the Campo de Fiori.
The bells of Santa Maria Maggiore
are still pealing for the auto-da-fé.

From here into the north, the ways are
dry. Yellow grass,
thirst in the roots. In the hearts.
It's all simple, but false.

When I try to think history,
the enormous vertebrae
of the dinosaur behind the purple beeches
in Invalidenstrasse,
Bismarck in marble,
and Benn, a nameplate on Bozener, lifeless.

In the depths of the bunkers
on Potsdamer Platz in Berlin
are the shoes of Hitler's favorite horse.
Profile of power: armor and helmet.

Translation broadens language
as divorce and remarriage extend family.

Born to fade and break, facts
huddle inside black brackets.

Work means inquisition as a child
separates a cricket’ s wings from thorax.

Ideas come apart as monads, metastasizing
rhapsody on the edge of delicate dusk.

Thunder sounds in the distance or television,
always on in this constant rain.

I know I promised to stop
talking about her,
but I was talking to myself.
The truth is, she’ s a child
who stopped growing,
so I’ ve always allowed her
to tag along, and when she brings
her melancholy close to me
I comfort her. Naturally
you’ re curious; you want to know
how she became a gnarled branch
veiled in diminutive blooms.
But I’ ve told you all I know.
I was sure she had secrets,
but she had no secrets.
I had to tell her mine.

What’ ll it be?

Roast beef on rye, with tomato and mayo.

Whaddaya want on it?

A swipe of mayo.
Pepper but no salt.

You got it. Roast beef on rye.
You want lettuce on that?

No. Just tomato and mayo.

Tomato and mayo. You got it.
… Salt and pepper?

No salt, just a little pepper.

You got it. No salt.
You want tomato.

Yes. Tomato. No lettuce.

No lettuce. You got it.
… No salt, right?

Right. No salt.

You got it. Pickle?

No, no pickle. Just tomato and mayo.
And pepper.

I don’ t know how fast I was going
but, even so, that’ s still
an intriguing question, officer,
and deserves a thoughtful response.
With the radio unfurling
Beethoven’ s Ode to Joy, you might
consider anything under 80 sacrilege.
Particularly on a parkway as lovely
as the one you’ re fortunate enough
to patrol — and patrol so diligently.
A loveliness that, if observed
at an appropriate rate of speed,
affords the kind of pleasure
which is in itself a reminder
of how civilization depends

Please think of this as not merely a piece
Of writing that anyone would fully
Appreciate, but as plain and simple
Words that attempt to arouse whatever
Appetencies you, especially, depend
Upon language to fulfill; that drench you
In several levels of meaning at once,
Rendering my presence superfluous.
In other words, welcome this as a poem,
Not merely a missive I’ ve slowly composed
And tucked under your windshield wiper
So that these onlookers who saw me bash
In your fender will think I’ m jotting down

Whereas the porch screen sags from
the weight of flowers (impatiens) that grew
against it, then piles of wet leaves,
then drifted snow; and

Whereas, now rolled like absence in its
drooping length, a dim gold wave,
sundown’ s last, cast across a sea of clouds
and the floating year, almost reaches
the legs of the low-slung chair; and

Whereas between bent trees flies
and bees twirl above apples
and peaches fallen on blue gravel; and

Good God!
What did I dream last night?
I dreamt I was the moon.
I woke and found myself still asleep.

It was like this: my face misted up from inside
And I came and went at will through a little peephole.
I had no voice, no mouth, nothing to express my trouble,
except my shadows leaning downhill, not quite parallel.

Many believe in the stars.

Take Quinamid
The son of a Dardanian astrologer
Who disregarded what his father said
And came to Troy in a taxi.

Gone.

Odysseus to Greece: