Congress is Happier Than Your Hand

1.

It isn’t death, whatever princes say,
Not when I dreamed of sandwiches, and kites
Fell on us all, like panicked meteors,
Leaving us naked at the first alarm.
These sheets don’t wind. These covers aren’t for keeps.

2.
Conceive of dirt as history, says Prince.
If you don’t dust, you’re worth a Ph.D.
In Native Studies: who you were Way Back,
Who was the Who before you were, and who
Taught grease stains how to kiss my lady’s hand.
It isn’t Alexander in a bung,
Not necessarily, but someone’s some
Distance away now, never regretful, made
A building block, like calcium or beets.
Don’t sweep: it might be love. It might be sense
Of history in Bag Type H, sucked up.

3.
We are not quite immune. This ham was once
A pig among his peers, a Gadarene,
Alliteration challenged, equaller;
And now a sandwich of most perfect gist,
Chap-fallen, cheesy. We shall all be toast.
If better not to be done, then pourquoi
Are pillows only broad enough for heads
Solus and undistinguished in the dark,
Though full of these dramatic congresses
With faces blurred? You know it isn’t death.

Born Under Our Bed Sign

Under my sign are born the hard of hearing,

The hard of heart, the hard-up double-clutched
Investigative annalists. We act
Out conversations with ourselves, until
We’ve polished every line to silken splendor,
And who cares if they never happen? Lust
Is academic, omnipresent, pent,
But not exactly personal. A tale,
Worth more than actuality, is told
In Roman periods, by steel dip pen,
To pages not intended to be read.
That is my sign, not her sign. Where she walks,
Firelilies blossom and bombs explode
In anthills underneath the path. The toll
Is glorious among the hoplites. Drones
Behead themselves in homage; cynics rise
Buck-naked from their tubs and bow. She lies
Like rivers flow, by nature. She observes
The holidays of vegetable dyes,
The saint-days of the unredeemed, the last
Rites of Pompeii. The birds all wish they were
Self basting in her wake. They know the signs.