What a crazy, synchronous flood of syllables sing from her mouth. What bobbing bunch of young, hard blueberries in the wind. What bollard-legged, hot pink shirt snorts off the Corolla hood and bellows to the valley lights about astrological warfare. What a simple but heart-tearing sex act from the trees. What song is this, that drones and thaws in wordless glory. What salmon-skinned six-footer double fists and in his belly, where quiet scrabbles, some good pity. What rubbing, what cheap-wood bench pilfered from the pharmacy corner, what mammoth globe moon about to crush the mountainside. What a stinking fire. What ghost octogenarian whispers from the dirt floor. What jiggle-jugged wide smile flicks aluminum can tops from the cliff. What, is this eternity, you tittering and shuddering and spitting, rosy with venery. What a magic, this God, who drapes his gracious sleeves around the circumference of this spitball. I am a defector, confounding our adversaries so that you can bloom in privacy, propagate. My lust is for a giant secretary desk and to scale oak trees at midnight. I quote John Berryman. I swam through Monet’s Impression, Sunrise and sucked up the orange sun. So, basically, I can desaturate the whole universe. I ate Bach, BWV 1043. It tasted German. I carved a bold shadow of myself and walked the river invulnerably while river teens threw trash. The glassy beards of river over the rocks applauded. I felt muzzy, swathed so by the stars. Deep in stars, I make a declaration: that birds shall not witness what beasts do. That, though my veins will surely bulge with sorrow. That, my ideas flushed into your mouths, you will emerge vestal fledglings, chests swelled to the sun, ready your syrinxes and go.

 

Photo By: Deb Collins