maria of the moon

how many sides does the moon have?
we divide it into two,
one for light, one for dark,
but i see a dim side
that hopeless color gray
like your eyes & cigarette ash,
& sparrow's wings,

this is the remote place
where the souls of everything
that burned down go,
sitting crosslegged with knees pulled up
gazing wistfully down on the earth
from the edges of huge, dry seas
reputedly made up of tears -
but how would tears get to the moon,
unless when we cried them
they went up
like tiny liquid balloons
that never pop -

this existence, most argue
is totally meaningless
without a thought for love
or destination
so i will light a lantern &
at the end of my life & escape
silently
hoping no one notices

& i will meet you there
with hands & pockets
full of the love i never believed in,
melting helplessly like icecubes
in the summer sun,
apologizing with my atlantic eyes
while we watch stars
nearer than they ever have been
streak across outerspace
& extinguish themselves violently
in a shower of sparks
like a cigarette
flung to the asphalt -

i hope we will dance
on this undiscovered third side of the moon,
i hope we will swim
in its gray sealess seas
& that we will kiss
for as long as forever lasts,
since we don't need to breathe
anymore -

i have confidence our souls
will be safe on this satellite
until the fidgeting hands of time
decide to dismantle it
& we float instead
hand in hand
through a new place
that has no end -

fragments

1.
he had an 88-key piano tattooed on his back and confided drunkenly to anyone who would listen that his deepest wish was to have a lover play Chopin on him during a thunderstorm.

2.
the dog with one eye knew nothing but pretended it knew everything. its owner named it Sibyl and every bark was treated like a prophecy.

one day the roof fell in

3.
rain on a Saturday. he sat in the window and lit matches, one after the other, timing how long he could hold them

4.
dogcatcher idle behind the steering wheel, chain-smoking. thunderstorm in his eyes and a caustic pain in his gut from all the coffee. in the back, the sound of claws against metal.

in the evening he stops by the playground and leers at the empty swings, the gold band on his finger chafing.

5.
ersatz moon over Menlo park! the spaces between the inventor’s idle hands crackle with the bated-breath leaping of electrons

outside, a set of flickering lovers waltz and then disappear

6.
he fell in love with a tornado and chased it across the country. wrote a hundred desperate letters and, when he got close enough, delivered them all by hand.

two counties over, as the sirens yelp, his wife weeps for something lost

7.
one day he starts collecting doorknobs, spends hours sitting at his desk, turning them

a lightbulb burns out with a startling snap and sizzles in the suddenly cyanotic dark

8.
a company of twelve, full-throated and laughing, buzzing with wine and good humor. one of them makes a joke about killing time and another smashes the clock on the wall to the floor.

“it just seemed like the right thing to do at the time,” he confesses, later. when he rolls up his sleeves, the detective notices the ten wristwatches he’s lashed to his arms, like phylacteries

9.
the veil lifts and everyone in the world is abruptly treated to the truth of their resurrections, can remember each life they’ve lived

the Mnemnosynarians build a church in the middle of the desert and murmur prayers consisting entirely of every name they’ve ever had

10.
when he showed up at the bar he announced that he’d scripted everything he was going to say that night and everyone thought he was insane until, at last call, he pulled out the pages and showed them what they’d said all night

11.

in the living room

the first time he bared his shoulders,
his father knew he was a hero. 

or was it that he knew
his father was a hero. 

the wail from a nearby speaker
neither confirmed one
nor disproved both of these things.

and when i am tired
it's my mind
having a conversation
with my body
saying over & over

time to dream

gilead

at dawn,
the sky opens its
treacherous mouth,
& chokes on
the poisonous fruit
of the sun -

let its gargled,
inarticulate prose
fill the ears
of those too hungover
to sense anything
other than static's roar -

let the juice
of that dawn
drip down the chins
of those still waking,
eyes glassy with hope
& throats seared by
the thoughts of those
futures which,
one night prior,
inflamed their hearts
with insane promise -

with those words which
could not provide balm
to their abraded souls -

& yet,
hear,
flesh
soughing
regretfully
over bone -

hear
the heave & sway
like a becalmed vessel
in a familiar harbour -
the yaw & creak
of something submerged
in the realm of memory -

like that ship,
rocking, pleasantly,
to & fro, tidally,
in the graying waves
of yesterday