Lanthanum 9.18

18

Within moist mollusc-husk of February pre-spring
on Prospect St. (outside the French House)
the little witch-hazel behind the wall lets loose
improvisations of gold leaf – her pliant blazoning

pent by chill wind. Early diviner, bent like Hobo
just tipping the keys (in Mendelssohn, maybe).
Leafpile mandorlas of wide gold laid siege to Heidi
there – blonde matrix & epitome (little sorrow-

tree, foretold). Tends thus his balance-beam,
Hobo, upon his shoulder... retrograde flame’s
importunate command, transposing that skim’s
taut-plaited graft. Hurt knight’s lamb-dream

across straitened chafening tightrope (aimless,
airborne). So the arc of arcs curves back
to the crackling hearth of Blackstone’s
own Quauhnahuac (yon implicate rubellipse,

myrrhrose). Limns the sunburst labyrinth
of Chartres, where Hobo inches (inch by inch...),
obswerves the hilarious limp of her firstborn. Cinch,
Blaise. The light’s manifest (emerald absinthe,

Vincent). & all this nonsense for a pin-
pricked star! Scythia-gold (Sheba-forsythia)
above mown grass; a handful of corn will flow
in brooks from the mountaintops (amen, Martin).

Blessed be his redemption-name. Because Love
is unstanchable fire’s (whirl-fabricladding, star-
enflashioning, volcán-swaheeling) sheer choir
y’Hawaii. Moltenscarred heart (hearth-stove).

2.25.12