down by the Rio Espiritu

CAVERN-KITCHEN

Cottonwoods mime autumnal Golgotha

down by the Rio Espiritu –

Eli, Eli, why have you...?

– branching-out concavex vesica

(tree become history).  Now the mirror

of round Galilee reverts

as when murky Po River’s

backward film flows to Ravenna shore;

magnetic gravity of Mary

reels the molting dove

into the tumult of

new-found Columbia’s eyrie –

cavern-kitchen full of Piero’s light,

her mummer’s earthbound feet

tap blessings to the fleet

in spires of crane-dance patter-flight.

The almond is a little tree

whose acorn eye marks

spoken blooms – arcs

from a sparkling diamond sea

triangulating stainèd glass

from humped Cahokia

to Saarinen-eye.

A speeding Spirit of St. Louis

soars to Notre Dame & Chartres;

steep-waltzing Trinity,

one 1-3-2 will be

your eagle-masque (dive, mère-maître).

10.12.16

wolf spider bite

I used to play a "tarantella" on the piano... I forget the composer (Mrs. Elledge, my piano teacher 45 years ago, would know).  I grew up in the Mendelssohn neighborhood of Edina, MN (named such by its early settlers, musicians with the Minnesota Symphony).  The tarantella has very ancient roots - it was originally an ecstatic, Dionysian dance meant to drive out the effects of a "tarantula" (actually, European black widow) spider bite.

WILD WEED

The monuments tremble in the mind

like shuddering leaves... the dun-

grey flesh of Russian

olive shoots (wild weed you find

along grey highways).  Clouds

resemble ships passing

(or sheep).  An everlasting

turtledove of new beginnings crowds

grey folds to elegant mosaic –

peacock splendor, rainbow

tarantella.  Help me now,

Ancient of Days – the mortal ache

of this wolf spider bite is like a prod

in the bull-dance arena.

I must rotate – ah,

Pocahontas handstand! – God

reward your goldfinch serenade!

Thunder & lightning speed

yon seraphim-steed

across acorn crucible (blade

pillaring smoke & fire upon hill

at Glastonbury, or

Golgotha).  Now you are

whittled down to walnut mind-rill...

pirouette... red veins of iron

rivet into diamond.

Bran-matière.  Pond-

ripple osprey, ranging (arak-golden).

7.5.16

Painting by Michael Gould (Elmer's glue & acrylic)

Concord, Columbia

KIEVAN ARK

This gazebo’s tilted octagon

of weathered, worm-eaten

cedar holds off the rain

in Minneapolis, again.

Again, Henry will dream his songe

like a train-hopping sponge

& let summer arrange

cloud-peaks of glory (strange

magnet, fourchette d’orange).  Concord,

Columbia – créatif

brain-fever of native

mer-wit – good Will’s three-cornered

cap of happiness (wasp Osip’s

honey-basket on the Hill

of Skull).  A game of skill

is Vladimir’s, & music too – the ship’s

a Kievan ark (turned right-side-up

beneath its choral dome).

Salt-azure breath of wisdom

streams from Maximus (one cup

of simple crumblevine); his prong

is set like Lebanon

cedar beside the chronic

faultline – earthquake birthpang,

epileptic flow.  & now one smile

reverses Golgotha

with OK light – it’s manna-

Madeleine (kneads pain into a grail).

5.25.16