that hexed hexagon

PRICKLY ROOFTOP

Only a light whisper of April snow

feathers the riverbank today.

The wind-serpent will flay

with rippling wings its own mud-brown

flow.  The cottonwoods lean overhead

like ribs on a canoe.  Gray veins

of some cast-off snakeskin.

Glass fane of Great Worm (empty, shed).

Where are the springs of yesteryear?

This April curls from cold

& back to cold.  From cold

to cold – inhuman, viral (some Shakespeare

Villon).  So the chill indifference

of animal aggression marks

its seal on each snowflake.

Each one unlike (unique monstrance).

So who invented this immaculate snow?

A mind of winter?  Or

a dreaming Melchior – his

clouds on high, his Bethlehem below?

We sleep, we wake… like soft snowflakes.

We drift, we float… we land

& melt upon a child’s hand.

The soul is like that dark green pine, makes

rough & prickly rooftop – root foundation

for each spindrift, wayfaring

Romany light-traveling

human earth-heart time-migration

*

– so hear the art then, O spiraling 

hearth!  Martian enfoldment

like arms of Odin, bent

around himself – whole tree corralling!

For Snowflake is that hexèd hexagon

of heaven & earth, joined

in your heart, coined

Abraham – red copper of the gun;

that regal object-dart of adoration

– tangled boomerang, returned

upon itself – urned

at the apex of our celebration;

the bread & wine of every sacrifice

offered by universal Everyman

each time she lifts the can

for mite or gold doubloon… our price.

The light snow sweeps across Ireland

& Minneapolis-St. Paul.

A sweet lamb looks from wall

of van Eyck emerald, almost human (sand

or salt will reveal her, underneath

Mississippi varnish).  Flowers

are eternal, soul-power

is substantial… MELEK shall bequeath

his welcome-gift of bread & wine

on his way to Memphis

for the garbage men.  This

my body… this my blood.  Lamp, shine.

4.3.20

Song of Songs in a snow globe

SWEET SNOW GLOBE

The twin foxes & three pine trees

on honeymoon (in a sweet

snow globe, in Norway).  What

use your Solomonic sarabande, these

loopy solemnities?  & the echoes

far into the motherland

Cahokia to maid’s Gravesend

your Adonai, my Adonis   a Memphis

trial by fire (intricate clay bark

buried in salt harbor).

O serious Nile laborer!

Nephthys, Dark Lady, mark

these fathoms of thy bottomland.

Snow was general over Ireland.

Strum the steel mandolin

then, Mary – plectrum in hand!

We climb out of the clay to shape

this Royal Arch, for St.

Latrobe & Son.  See the faint

wave-trace along its rim (crêpe

for a funeral train; flute-song

transcription).  Grain

melts into wine again –

the living man or woman prong

from earth.  We called it love

& swam into the circle

where snowflakes speckle

dark green live oaks (O crooning dove).

1.16.20

your glance will not be replicated

Nadezhda Mandelstam

FOR HARRIET, FOR LIDIA

          to Lena Archer & Barbara Swanson

This falling snow at end of year

seals all our doings

& rememberings

with soft imprint of upper atmosphere.

Each snowflake is a face, or signature

disintegrated from the sky

from Ocean’s continuity

come down to live, to die – to melt, unsure

back to the common spring (indifferent

& all-encompassing).

Watch generations passing

with the calendar.  Grandma, bent

to join her friends again (under

the ground).  & we are left

to plow along... to heft

the load she bore, so bright & clear.

Your glance will not be replicated

nor your smile rehearsed.

The gentle ones, who nursed

each flower into breath, are translated

beneath an arc of sapphire sky

into their immortality –

embrace each earthy

being-born, each learning how-to-die.

There are these women... limping

over the frozen steppe.

See how they leap

now!  Lifting off... (on seraph wing).

12.30.19

Byzantium or high Armenia

SPRUNG RITE

Light snow cascades into December dusk.

Each flake a brief memento

of infinity.  Drifting so

far... from a distant world.  Ask

& it shall be given unto you,

intones the snowy-mantled

priest (Byzantium,

or high Armenia).  So the seed grew

amid its granary of full, deep faith.

Here in Minneapolis,

first snow is ceremonious.

A sanctification for the dying earth,

a last light blessing to the forehead

of a fading year.  I think

of Roger, leaning at the brink

of the Terrace... one hand lifted

floating over Providence spread out below

& miming his canoe’s prow –

an equilibrium of high & low,

of holy & mundane (Jonah-Hobo).

& Henry, tilting on the pivot-point

of Berryman’s rail (Washington)

is rescued from oblivion

by a mustard seed of restoration... faint

hexagon of gold sky-fire, transfiguring

the babble of his broken tongue

to chaste vision – sprung

rite from Ravenna (almond wing).

12.1.19

I'm only thinking of you

SIMPLE MUTTER

Snow-canyons decorate the streets

of staid Minneapolis;

sparkling crystals

coagulate in mountains, glacier sheets.

Ripe grain of whole, deep faith,

murmured epileptic

Osip – stamping his shtick

of shaman-Pushkinite (limpid wraith).

Tiny hexagons of Siberian ice.

The glowing eyes of thief-

wolves, killing for life.

Vast evanescent Paradise

in an infinite complexity

of human innocence

destroyed by violence –

Patmos St.-Vitus peripety

of mangled lambs.  I’m only

thinking of you, dear

spark (unknown Shakespeare

pebble-soldier... yearning mystery).

Gemstones of civilization glitter

through the drab darkness.

You are only weakness

squeezed into clay – a simple mutter,

oscillating like a reddish agate

in a muddy kid’s palm

(copper reunion-psalm).

Jamie discovered it – I won’t forget.

2.24.19

like a lost Osiris

photo by Aaron Siskind (Cuzco)

WAVY LIPS

On the coldest night in a generation

on a bridge in Minneapolis

one delicate snowflake melts

into her crevices of Inca stone.

Berryman, like a lost Osiris

wavers on the railing...

& maidens will be wailing

in Ramah, because she is

no more.  A forgotten Muse

of Memory – figure

of a little almond tree –

stays hidden (somewhere in D.C.).

I gather the limbs of Osiris

whispers Isis (under

her obelisk of wonder

blundering toward Sirius).

She remains behind her veil

out there in West Branch,

like a soft eyelash

encircling the ark of Israel –

like the cow-eyed prow of Argo

or sea-tossed glance

of Magdalen-experience;

the wavy lips of the vessel flow

into a primavera Ocean State...

your dream-song Jonah

breathing – hallelujah! –

from polar ice to coracle checkmate.

1.27.19

from light snow-years

COPPER RING

Snow tumbles into Minneapolis.

Twin Cities.  Meanwhile

the InSight capsule

settles onto Mars – whose promise

is to probe beneath the surface,

appraise the molten core

of our God of War

(riddle of the Minotaur).  Space

beckons insight down path P

toward planet X –

our dream of PAX

curled inside violence (a middle C

unrolling from the Lake of Galilee).

O Beast from Ocean,

dread Leviathan –

a void between two notes... blank lee

of the abyss!  The infant’s misery –

missing her heartbeat

once, with her complete

Oneness... whorled... into infinity?

Where Martian drones attack Queen Bea

(just being Bea, around

a crater in the Netherlands)

by orders of omnipotent Pharaoh

whose eye is like a palindrome

(kayak in garage)

from old (Ionic age)

Emordnilap – our catenary home

                   *

a long-suspended violet bloom

breathes hope, & yearning

for some answering

anemone (your cypripedium

reginae).  Orange-azure M-bridge

for an owlman... almond

OMO... woman-bond

of wisdom... dancing G-bride...

light between J-pillars, Okean-trees!

Out of the twomb

you spiraling come,

@tlantis – Jewel of July, high C of seas!

A copper ring from Palestine

incised with simple krater

& the name, PILATE

recalls the one whose sign

for “heart” breathes from the swing

of time (your twin, Julie).

Rose, rowing from the key

called PAX, which passeth understanding –

yet from each ordinary tent

of refugees, each family,

once forced to flee

from the mad king (sad infant

Minotaur), will come to bear

a normal world again –

out of the dream of man

& woman (breezes flowering the air).

12.1.18

Shakespearean marzipan

THREE BEARS

Behind fine axe-hewn basalt

of the Incan hive, an eye

like Aaron Siskind, maybe –

quick, delicate, alert.

Mortised ramparts of any state

mark its mandala-border;

stone blooms of order

warp twisters of love & hate.

Only this human heart of flesh

harbors invisible diamond –

petal-scent of almond,

marzipan snowstorm (baked fresh).

Imagine one simplified snowflake

in three dimensions, spinning

like a gyroscope (one wing,

one leg) after one thunder-shake

of glassy dome – Will’s trident, maybe

in a late romance (Blackfriar’s

globe).  King Henry sires

trouble for himself – falls into sea

pursued by Bear.  Near Normandy,

flagship goes down – she’s lost,

it seems – until at last

Hermione steps forth, sleepy...

La Paix (familial, civil, global)

breathes yet, to dance once more.

It was Sir Thomas More,

lapped in bearskin, at the North Pole

                 *

who played the bear, who played the fool;

who played Disoriented Lamb

bleating I am, I am,

who flit the snowflake (melting soul);

his mother (Everywoman, from

Mulberry Street) wept

for the shame; she slept,

& it was glory in the end.  Hum

flickers (pictures in a whisper gallery).

The cranium of Unknown

Soldier wears the crown.

Empires of high frozen sophistry

shudder beneath an infant’s smiling

gaze.  It’s not the wise

who find the way (surprise!)

but every lovey-dovey Sing-Sing

resident – repentant heart, meek

mule.  Chaste planetary

hearth, Psyche-egalité –

bright thunder-akme... slant, oblique

world-pirouette... Hagia Sophia

in a peacock’s fan.  Tango,

barefoot kid’s fandango

under the sky-vaults in Ravenna –

light of my light & yours,

Waltz of Three Bears

by Mendelssohn.  Flares

Franciscan, by Pacific shores.

6.14.17

elephant burials

SOFT RIVERBEND

Snowflakes crystallize, unique

& elegant.  Mandala-

knots (of ice).  Then follow

the sun, like dew in a raven’s beak.

Into the rain, the river, Ocean.

Heart’s slow dilation.

Sunken beams of pain,

of petrified love... beyond reason.

Light tracks of salt, the tears

of trees.  Sacrament

of speechless element –

elephant burials.  Fallow years.

Inarticulate, dumbfounded soul.

The knowledge of the end

in each soft riverbend –

her fingerprint, on clay bowl.

Dreams gather, so.  The dream.

A curly wave of sheep

threading from the deep

time-meadows.  Trim trireme,

bearing a casket wrapped in fleece –

matrix of Paradise,

grail-caduceus

lifting each Jonah to release.

The air murmurs immortal Spring;

your friend is limping sweetly

by your side.  The tree

of Galilee is blossoming.

1.17.17

on the snow path

MOSAIC WELL

On the snow path between bridges

the sun squints beneath

clouds; twin hawks unsheath

talons, whirl over river’s edge

(aerial wrestle-dance).  Winter sky

slows the flow down,

frozen.  Last windblown

oak leaves sail the bone-dry

ground.  Yet in another age

innocent gold honey

fed the sons of Zebedee

from almond lips of Nazir-sage –

his eagle-crow, accompanied

by flutes & turtledoves.

The knot of shackled loves

in your Knossos-heart are freed

when crystalline snow-light, like salt

shines through the octagon

of your mandorla – son

& father, sister mother & daughter melt

into one mead-measure of fire

& the smile of Manitou

mirrors an arc for you –

primordial apse of Apollinaire.

Whorled vortex of the shepherd’s roam

reveals a human face

in that holy place –

mosaic well from kingdom come.

12.8.16

you cannot buy free soul

FLAT VODKA

The weather is alchemical,

the mix is changeable

& lethal – Lear will fumble

through the hailstorm, inconsolable.

The air is saturate with salt.

Even the snow is bitter

as flat vodka.  Better

to butter up the mayor, Walt –

don’t you think?  I don’t.

His orange head is swollen

full of bloody poll-pollen –

he likely toss you to the Don.

Phosphoric Osip fingers his Commedia

for signs of figlio

della figlia... down Rio

del Espiritu wend lilac, willow, etc...

Dumb Cordelia keeps her counsel.

Won’t corrode the word

filial with a coarse reward.

You cannot buy free soul,

dear heart – & salt is cheap.

Cotton bolls is de termite,

but woe unto de spite-

docta, who sow to weep.

I see a Solominka mincing

on the edge of a knife,

a precipice – fine

Ravel for violin (pining).

11.18.16

Where the crooked sumacs are

BACKWARD THUNDER

The Redeye of these freight cars’

heavy backward thunder

over rubidium crossbars’

X.  Where the crooked sumacs are –

their creaky grey akimbo-structures

(rusty caducei).  Amorpho-

phallus Titanium?  No,

not quite... but ruddy, like Osiris-

Oedipus (up 3-Way Highway,

where the pylons meet).

Eddy Parallactic,

relatively paralytic – all that whey

so massive, bending light around

Caesar’s own seizures,

jade embrasures

(pyramidical, tyrannical, profound).

The iron Bruegel earth turns so,

in snowy dunes.  Until

one feathery perpendicular

percolates up (with bleaker crow).

Light eddied, slow (28, 29...)

where a spring coils

moss-green (oeuil

of Bosch, in Kansas City sun);

where Iris plants meek sovereignty

by Eero-Eeyore Gate – &

Eurydice, come late

May, rose... (tiny Iona tree).

2.2.16

MN Arboretum (Jan. 2016)