October 24, 2007

passing


a passage from proverbs he chose
marked like a quail's crown

no one exists alone but a
spineless attorney taking advantage of misery

or a steaming bubbling beautiful wife
over trees & plates tonight

& chains of bondsmen dragging on the ground
as the curiously glowing guard dogs bark

as when rolling breakers boom a precipice
& our would-be cities fall & then things bloom

ever more hurt than substance will
accrue to you I say thru locks of curled wire

I’d entrap myself rather than prepare in advance
a music of words caught up in polemical blood

a question does not come before
don’t seek haven in my shadow

for making well crafted objects
I ought not to fail because I am not your lover

I felt the heart within me fall & flutter
the voice an artificial hermetic closet

a resting-place full of summer sounds & scents
that I suspect is virtual discourse

fear sticking up its head
& ticking as if earth were going to be ready

we'd lie under covers gossip & read my poetry
talk approaching ornament & image

this must be a sacred spot close quote
couldn’t speak had nothing to say


(January 19, 2007)

—Bill Lavender

Posted by dwaber at 01:02 PM