this dumb temple

I am sorry,
body
that when I put my ninth
beer
into you
that you
break down
completely
there
is nothing wrong
with the beer

I am sorry,
breast
that when
my hand
touches you
the intent
was for the breast, alone
but the hand
is selfish

I am sorry,
brain
that the heart
last night
wantedwhattheheartwanted
there were too many lovely people
some, even
stunning
(said the eye)
and now (brain)
your punishment is
cruel
they’re throwing plates
at your skull’s dry walls
from the
in/side

I am sorry,
eyes
that sorrow speaks to you first
first the accident
the sudden mist of blood
then the hands
filled with glass
the hands
and the palm
and the forearm
the chest
fills with glass
then the father
his head
his loss
his boy
his grief
his mouth
at the early wake
speaks his child’s soft bible
of accomplishments
andalmostnever
his defeat
but eyes
I am so very
sorry
you get it first

I am
sorry,
legs
that wobble
under the Atlas globe
of a lifetime’s gravity
that we don’t
decide
half/way through
to walk
on our hands
to give you two
a sabbatical
from the cross which is our dome and torso

but mostly
I am sorry,
head
for the beer
I guess and liver
maybe, kid
neys
you selfish little bastards
you were not made correctly
because
I can say
beyond a shadow
of a doubt
that the beer,
was.

the yes no

Toledo has a sister city
in Spain
sister people,
sister pains

when someone in Toledo shoots his brother in the street
someone in this Toledo drops a bowl of ice cream

when someone swabs the deck
on a ship in the queen’s fleet
a prison lock
over these parts
falls off its bars

when round the block
the accidental prisoners go correspondingly free
a daughter in Spain runs amok
with her evil little butterfly traps

and just under that mushroom there
the little Toledan
can hear the butterfly screams
whose flutters effectively forecast
its doppelgänger's weather

when One Toledo’s parishioner parishions
Two Toledo’s counterpart assemblyman’s credence
perishes to golf

so phone lines have been set up
across the climates
schedules checked
the scramble to pick up broken lightbulbs
is something to see
in Here, Ohio
when a Spaniard boy falls in love

why just right now
the failing propeller
in the airplane you happen to be falling within
downwards towards the Maumee River
has its own propeller partner
carefully pulling the Spanish you
off the tarmac

and in my dreams, I am dead

in that room
is the woman that I love
more than any other woman
beside her,
the kid we made

in the center of my spine lies a ripchord
that leads back to that room
no matter how far my heart takes me
it’s the antidivorce chord,
the blood chord,
the survival tooth

in my commute
Roman trees look down upon me
as Roman scrapers look down upon them, they
the trees, the high-rises,
hold their Roman clipboards
good Roman
say they

not poor
not rich
not jailed
not for long
not gay
nor straight
has Roman accounts
with many Roman corporations
the teevee,
the gas,
has regular Roman eating habits
eats Roman animals
and Roman plants

the woman,
loved more than anyother,
can detect this heavy atmosphere
on my skin
more often
than on her own

she escapes
her death is a sweeter release
than mine
she thinks,
sometimes says,
isn’t it nice
that one day we get to die

that’s a semi-bad Roman mantra
Rome was created from fear
mainly of death
but also
of Rome, herself
a Rome will get you attitude
is essential to the good Roman
like knowing
how far one lives from the Roman fusion plant
or marking where the exits are in Roman megaplexes
especially, on the rare Roman occasion
when one Roman cracks
and sprays the Roman moviegoers
with domestic Roman
bullets

when my commute
is significantly done
an invisible hand pulls my ripchord
which leads to a bed we bought on credit
because everyone needs an expensive bed
to survive Rome

I sleep heavily
sleep, to me is an Atlantic Ocean
and in my dreams
I am dead

letter from Jonah

I found a shark tooth
and a yearbook
there were fish bones
and some flamingos that they put out in people’s yards

there was a pencil
it was chewed on
I thought about Samson
and tried to pull the fish apart it was useless
I found a boat flare
I waited for the right time
the right time kept from me
I wanted neighbors
I wanted a surf board
I got a dirty magazine
it became boring
the twelfth time around
I wanted television
radio
I got a walkie-talkie
who was obviously
angry
at me                                                                    

on our backs

in our winter clothes
counting the windows
of my father’s house

you ask about the people
who live there now
I say the man, he’s old
the woman, she’s crazy
they’re doing their best to live up to the portraits
crucified to the drywall
the light that bounces off the manicured grass
is light, enough
that the scene could be Rockwellian
could be pornography

I rolodex though the pals who would have now
betrayed me since high school
run their names through a filter of new math
of those that died dumbly,
and those who have since found Jesus Christ and
the equation is even
I don’t even tip the scales
half of me is dead
the other half of me belongs to Jesus

familiar family cars roll up the driveway
with parents
scolding their christened kids
in their holiday sneers
and fiercely parted hair
furious in their accuracies
we are whiskey drunk
and flinch
when the headlights ransack us
the dragnets of their voices
beckon us in
a brother, maybe
hands me a package
with a smirk

I whisper in my wife’s ear that I am somewhere else
up in coney island
there is a painted woman
airbrushing the first coat on a parade float
I am a merman
King Neptune
tossing beads into the sea
skipping bottle tops from the Wonder Wheel
down to the pavement below

last week
a baby boy
we both knew
fell asleep in his crib
and never woke up
and the lines
on our faces
prove we’ve been playing dress-up
with our own daughter
in his tiny sneakers
we’ve been choking down conversations
faking whole holidays
bluffing our hands
you ask
when
will this year end
you asked that twelve months ago

I pull out the classifieds
in my father’s town
and look up the prices to used motorcycles

negligible creed

the soil is not soft
in my time
I want to create something ugly and something beautiful
and show them to you
and say

here
is something beautiful

here
is something ugly

I made them.