Not Unlike Rivers

Ripples roll through the
inland waterway and tall grass on its banks.
The water remains black
with shards of navy
when the sun falls in, fractures,
floats.

The crest of wake
from the largest boats
are tinged East Coast brackish:
     mouthful of tea at the bottom of a white mug.



My Understanding of Wake

High surf on beach roads.
Dad yells to other drivers
"No Wake!" and chuckles.

***

I remember no
specific instance of definition:
my desire after death.

***

I roused in dank sheets,
shaved with her steam on the mirror;
it came in a dream.



Fixation

These clumps of grass
thin enough that sunlight makes them
blurryhazy. Makes them glow.

Your thin hair
that you had pulled up so aptly above your neck
last time you dodged my eyes and
"Hello".

Laying on my arm,
strands sliding over it
until my arm is colored oil-spill brunette.

I stared through,
as you paralleled me back-to-stomach,
blurring it out the sun.



At Arm's Length III

in
ourselves too much
and the brain twistmixing
turning in on itself like dough

we are in ourselves too much
and we harbor shallow breaths
aware of other shadows
painted on our shoes

and behind Berlin Walls
there is air filled with us
throwing itself at the glow
beyond the teeth and parted lips



The Switch

bipolar passes like beached waves
and part of me goes to sleep