Works

It's Epsom but could pass for Epping,
New Forest or Dumbarton Wood.

There's ivy of the thickest
English sort not commonly
found in America; sprigs
growing across open ground
mantling it....

Had I been
a gambling man,
eschewing the "shoe"
of chemin de fer ...
perpetually perched upon that throne
... effete kingdom of the dice.

II
I am that gambling man ......

My mind, rarely with me alone,
parts with energy,
the floor boards scuffed
and landing beams just
roosts big enough for pigeons
on leave from fields
darker for their grain.

For one, street argot became tougher.
You had to distinguish between what you meant by calling someone a mother.
The Black Panther influence, no doubt, but a rejuvenation of the...

1

I won't envy the heat this August.
The fall (English say autumn)
burrowing like urinating dogs
thru trees,
carrying winter woolies
with sniff of air
crisscrossing the lion's tamer's...

Sleep is a striking woman
accosted by various men
while in a dance;
the warring desires thus
present themselves as on
a battlefield -
hunger comes arrayed with
red plumes to befit...

Little red berries are
the crop of this stump tree.
They are the prize stubble
where little growth is come.

A transplant of hair after
a serious illness
or after fire ravages...

At times, I thought of swizzling white rum
in the tropics (not as a vocation),
dropping into the club
for a round of tennis
before dinner at eight
or a quiet set of darts
before retiring.
...

Looking into the glassy crucifix of water.
slits of rock form stigmata across creviced limestone -
green pools with an occasional fish passing
air bubbles to the top...

"The universe is expanding".
There's cause for reflection and bound to do wonders
for "who am I" queries.

At this late moment on the Celestial Clock, man isn't...

In my childhood, "Verdun," meant madness.
Bars on the windows, cages around the intellect.
Time was a poor keeper of souls, it seems, wore out all but...

Les bougies sur les tombeaux
(The candles on the graves)
antilles dread locks ...
french chocolate it is not.

Too greedy hormonal levels,
savouring drives and swooned walrus tusks
behind the deep belly
of tireless sea,
propel ocean crates
looser for their water
than blood
to devour cavernous shores,...

You said happiness was a bird
- a hand extended
could bend its perch.
span the perfect wings.

I spoke of swallows.
lived off flies
ebbed when flying.
seldom came to rest.

These eyes of dolls seem leaden stones
not canisters of the Faith
but cannon-balls engraved
in tome-like stares so much
waxen shapes, these dust cloths
& spidery webs.

Dolls with eyes stare...

A boat sits on the very shallows
of a lake
in egg-cup fashion,
a tea-cosy covering waves,
orchestrating the bob of colours
in white enamel blue
inverted water.
...

The trees
are forming hands
to cloak the sky
with pillow whispers,
until the soft equilibrium
behind laughing eyes
departs down the moon dark world.

In the crypt with Columbus
in the crypt with Giovanni
of Genoa, the diaspora driven Jew;
watching flecks of the cathedral floor
jade-eyed and mica afraid...

I imagine stars at the dragon's tail,
eyelids ringing with butter.

I want to brush palms as
lightly as two sparks.
take the wand of your waist
in two plush hands
with the pitiless gesture...

The gathering of dead wood - driven,
pinched in faces between
the strain of Van Gogh's setting -
had all the more realism
hastening down that leaden street.
...