The chance for atrophy in my spine

or the recession of my brain from its skull cap

for dyes that decorate my blood stream

and an orbit of magnets

to shine with the density of objects

reports, the unusuals holes that are observed by the attendant

within this sleight

is the bereavement of scars,

this is the time for detachment

like when she stares at a page of shoes

I too am flying around the room

engineering the implication of symptoms,

pushing the tip of decay,

extruded through each finger and vein

the pulse of a deranged identity

to feel all of the iron

to feel the placement of every nerve

this is how i know now

that there, spaces are blank  

dyeing my dianthus along its edge  

color being drawn through the xylem

or just by touching

lipids stain their way into the paper

these points bleed and merge;

I pursue some wild interpolation

no matter how dense the innervation

the tapping performs

the cutaneous rabbit illusion

my morning spent with phantom limb

this is how I know,

it is true,

no thing is complete

the degradation of connective tissue

as if it is a mapped degeneration,

an unraveling of the remarkable sheath,

visible decay

crosses the sheet of capillaries that raise to my skin

a filling of the complexion with gray ash

instead of live meat

or if it is

that my thoughts do not perform the way they should

an experiment

to expunge any worthwhile vanity

novel sentiment

well-owned nostalgia

any other necessary self-cruelties

or telling artifacts

to deride a compulsion for bruxism

as pits start to wallow in calcium

fluoride and enamel

and a strengthening jaw

gnawing at this poor straw

to correct the workings of mine brain

to see if the pain of living subsides

a pill rides in my sandy pocket

polished and coat

brandishing the markings from the swamp

removed to the mud and grime

and the grease of sweat and palm

flaking color

staining the fate, head, and heart lines

ingesting the stump

to circulate in my glut

i wonder if i will stop, after a while

removing the purpose from my mind

on a holiday I cut a tree in half,

suckers push from the collars

this fresh wound keeping rhythm with its pumping

verdant-letting

despite loss of limb and unbalanced humours

does not slow its routine

this fallen bough

with the scent of drying leaves

spreading like smoke and tea

as memory forms

just as words receive their soft twist of meaning;

but i can not tell you about this

as what i consume regularly becomes part of my nature

that is not lake, that is not red

that is not some stone poem,

that I incorporate into being  

lifted long enough

my lowered legs seem to drop

below the plane of the floor
planning their verified desire
or their moment of justice

this is how i still know it’s true

that no thing is genuine.

when I lay, stridulating,

shifting a dull hum

tried by the closing of my eyes

fits of electricity

a ruin of lovely sleep

my extremities turning over in brambles

even now

enough, enough

I have already conceded.

how should I choose

when for almost everything

the value of caring is less

than the energy required to make a decision?

i make a good living

but my wife thinks im boring

my son is a jewel

who thinks im a liability

magazine subscription

shuffling axioms for a season of fashion

I have a list of things i am going to buy

i am not afraid to stay because i know that i will die here

this is anxiety is a constant recovery

so much so that,

following rest,

when one is back to normal,

they are immediately stricken ill

it takes everything to be brave

but it is not courage

or the joy that comes from answering the phone

just as i forget and am careless with my digging

the poison mixes with the dirt

and i becomes scratching like a dog

shedding scales of putrid oil and citrus

in the dark earth

as acid in my throat

I spend the new years alone

lighting the fire

with bits of the christmas tree

the earth annealing

softening the barbs

rutty with the blush of iron,

scrub, and wire

on the bus their breast plates rise and fall,

pushed by swollen lungs

all wrapped in a steel cage

the grill opens with the smell of aluminium and old chicken fat
catching the drippings from the yellow skin

touring the exhaust of engines

on this cold morning

scent exhumes from the frost and ice

it seems the only thing one can feel is relief

They thought we were waiting in line

but we were just milling around

Blood cells file through

So I avoid the people

I avoid that feeling of looking like you’re standing in line

when you’re not

thinking of all the art that comes with computers

landscapes

waves

with twigs and chickadee

ice red berries

which ones i can eat and which ones i cant

The conditioning that comes from predicting keyword search terms

Remember that time we went to the forest

And what it means

That i see a problem

with only being happy

When you forget the world exists

with a modern economy

with the training they provide

now I only need to follow my dreams

and no judgment can be placed upon me

how lucky am i

good at

fits perfectly with morale actions

rubber tubing

measuring traffic density and behavior

the market is filled with stacks and stacks
kept crisp with an intermittent mist
some new type of drinks
and I feel real

bowling through the lanes

this is some trap
it appears too symmetrical
even here, where the produce is arranged to be random
the attendant is acting strange
laying out this bait
poorly disguised as a system of codes
they track me

as we know

for the domestication of animals,

fear must be separated from survival

i profess my loyalty

and i name my company with sufficient lingual and alphabetic isolation  

it can be found by search engines

to represent a unique bit of waining identity.

so i am poised

as a constant angle

of schooling fish

or migrating birds

when my parents died

it was a relief

Knowing, then, all the things i should have said
(now)i can go about unabashed

listening late into the night, when they boost the radio waves;  

the sounds that bounce off the clouds

i dont feel like they deserved

my happiness

now that i have shared nothing

what must remain is only sacred to me

now that I have no work to barter

i do not support their currency

im better than them

and now i want to prove it

i hope my son dies before i do
while there is still some place to bury him

and when he did die

sinfully, with what we imbued

we will cry

hold hands

when i am older,

every day

I will imagine him grown

on the first holiday we will give ourselves a break from grief

lounging

my lower half in the water

arms folded across

the warmth of the concrete at the edge of the pool

the rough border heat

dissolving liquid and the darkness in my hair

this constant stress (turnover) is breaking me down

this is the cost of living on the shore

to be hurtful

As she lounges in her pool chair

my wife says she does not love me

without the permanence of children

that ours was so poor

to what our son could afford

but she meant it

i stand there dripping

Raspberries float in her water glass

i thought we had decided, that we were enough

he did not live long enough to let you down

a wet sheet shook

and spread to float on air

that smells sweetly as unsoiled cloth

which breezes through the screen and over the graying wooden sill

pollen and insects pool in the corners

brittle thorax and its stinger

this catkin with its pale spent anthers;   

there are near disasters

when one can’t yield

so that they do not flee

i pretend we are not doomed

though I know it is dire

now i am not afraid to stay

(i forget the tragedy that happened yesterday and instead

i practice disaster everyday

because i know that i will die here

we are the fleeting few

the withdrawn

the retreaters that do not progress but stay

and so now i have this terror

that if all my worst thoughts were to befall me,  

I would still be alive.  

Blue smoke curling over towheaded battlefield

flaxen and bloodied hooks of straw

shifting planes of focus and prairie wind

my lean features

holding this embrasure

my jaw against cool stone

i am tired of fighting

i do not want to be

something else
just this ancient weapon,

these fleshy hands,

and this feeling,

at once,

of crying and joy