When they sing the voice rises shakes and rises 
to the tones of the song, the wound  
complains and shakes, it feels so
when the wound is looked at the looker
begins to when the light 
source is raised the plant  
climbs when the throat is
elongated the note sung when I
walked on thin margins of gray grass
and asphalt grit when he asked if someone
trespassed on his property at what point could he
kill her—I can’t believe spring is here
or I pay to have my head filter radiation and who 
owns the trucks and this equipment unloaded on
my lawn? And if it’s a cliché to talk about small creatures
then we’ll talk about the big creatures, the glory and devastation
the thyme 9/10ths dead and gone
only a few green stars left under the mulch
when you run out of trespasses 
to be forgiven for when whatever is what gets us off
when the wind blows, standing by the window
with a new shoulder bag, two hours early
to interview for a job that’s been liquidated
when you feel innocent, you feel innocent when 
the wind blows, I spend  
all weekend in bed, Lord I do—I
want you when the wind blows
let it blow the altar an opening  
built from split and charred wood, stones
from incomplete circuits and algorithms growing
abortions made of petals, the altar prayer as movement through
between its scaled, black limbs or
a river, wading toward you through the not weak
current, to the center, the altar being to descend
beneath, to be there, among what
pulls hard and no air in the river or a hand
on my neck in a cold rain that erodes proposed
worlds like mud clods, like a cold rain that
erodes microcosm factories like
mud clods, a cold rain that
erodes economies of rain, this
would be shameless and quotidian, Lord
I would describe my father
but I’ve already squeezed a misty 
pink noise from the soaked 
oblong loaf of his lungs
I’d like to think you hate a lie told
twice, so forgive me 
a screw made of soap
a violin case full of mucus, and here I am
standing between two scrub pines
drinking the river-fading glister
overhead, the honk of migrating once-was’es descending
to the surface where parallel
blots are widening into a sentimental family tableaux
This is where I stick my head in the liquid
fire of the sun and piss myself while
burning vistas multiply 
I affix the electrodes to my throat 
Look kindly on our needs in this pilgrimage
and increase the electricity and
push my face further into a pillow on the hotel bed
When will you marry me? 
I made a hit for a low resolution gaming system
it was perceived one of my hand shadows was
raping the other, so I’m not
allowed to get my hands within 50 feet
of light—It’s not funny, I know, Lord
this is preface, preamble 
tapping the bottoms with my knees 
All I have to say is—the dead
in this room, this city or trailer park, the negatives
of buildings, the thin aluminum or drywall dust
I am small, lies are glue, what
I want doesn’t matter, you  
can build with it, I have
I do—Is this my word
through a woven screen
before the validation apparatus? Hoping
this is lost between  
relay stations as blood from
the body, out of circulation
drifting interminably through  
and maybe some cellos and maybe
one grain of light in an atlas darkness  
Now that’s an edifice, an altar
black teeth chewing on a huge purple intestine
one hand with no nerves rotting
the other strong with love
The devil takes his, that part
of a heart’s chamber, six fingers
a hemisphere of this skull
when the sun hits wrinkled glass 
in a small room in the shadow of a book case
pulling the chest hairs
from the electrode glue, squeezing 
my neck and shoulders 
trying to find a vein to send electricity through
without insurance or a job
without pain killers, neck unable to hold the weight
of the head without a nauseous shiver
a month, a time to stop measuring
My body failed, my brain failed, stopped
cell phone clock, a torn abdomen—intervening hell, Lord
like a hatch on a zeppelin over the city
your gates are opening—This is when the fire rises
when like tongued weeds a channel of green fire pours from the ground 
when where I am broken is circumscribed by green fire
when through the soil the bones of snakes, opossums, rabbits, and saints rise 
to float on the green fire—when Mary, when Lord, when Christ, when Jesus, when Beast
when Holy, when Ghost, when salt, when harrow, when snow
the deer dancing on its hind legs in this cul de sac
rose petals fixed to her yellowing skull