upon St. Swithin's Day

MONARCH MILK

‘Tis hot & muggy in the octagon

upon St. Swithin’s Day.

& will it rain?  Say.

St. Emperor Henry’s (Holy Roman)

also, once upon a time.  It’s stifling.

An unreal toad usurps

the garden throne, & burps.

His orange tongue is mean, & trifling;

his fire-red refuge-chair is for a child

who hasn’t come home

in 33 years.  Christendom

conquered the Holy Sepulchre... wild

slaughter & rejoicing on this day,
1099.  But will his Ghost

lift from that gloomy host?

Joachim daubs a fingerpaint contrary

blindly, with bare feet (a cave-fresco

for San Francisco).  & Henry

plots his own obscure & minatory

figure : double wheels.  Of milky glow

& river-clay – Cahokia, North Star.

To turn the Great Year

5 29s... & spin from here

some monarch milk (a little almond to restore).

7.15.19

sealed by kiss

FUGAL DRONE

This May light by the Mississippi.

Evening radiance

of ripeness – deep silence.

Nature can’t be explained, you see –

just felt.  The invisible sustains

the visible.  The unspoken

bee-silk tread, unbroken

dangling between a line of cranes

(fixed image from a coasting film

of tears, pooling in swamps

outside Ravenna dumps).

The retina, the iris-realm –

trim silence of almond canoe

hung up in dim garage

of old Ferrara (green

mirage).  She’s looking for you.

Calling you.  Her light curves round.

Curves round a pyx

hexagonal (X marks

her).  Regal Em, par exemple   bound

for glory in an Amherst cell

her russet star flames

golden dome   her name’s

a plunging eagle’s parallel

O gram of wheat  slanting to water

where the match strikes fire

in Mary’s   mirror-empire

as   furiously spinning   mutter-potter

                  *

echoes one   light-blazing choir

fluke-blinded hearth-power

of black earth-heart   your

milky diamond   from trench-cold mire

The universe is made of this.

A new world beckons now

from almond soil.  Plow

of the old world, sealed by kiss –

recycling topsoil of time

from Raven-Wife to salt

Ravenna – vernal vault

of Juliet to St. Louis sublime.

Moses – padre of Cleopatra,

stepfather of Jessie O.,

veteran of Shiloh...

he might know.  The river mantra

for the quick & dead (a strong drown-

gong) is fugal drone –

peepers in a mud-cone

warbling (like robins in a round).

Across there, from Monk’s Mound.

The planetary plate

is studded with jagged fate –

but we will make a joyful sound,

O froggy clown.  King Charles 3rd

awaits his guilty crown...

Henry is plastering his own.

His throne’s Columbian (a golden bird).

5.15.17