said isn't told

said isn't told. said
isn't telling. i've told
the hours to slow.
i've told
minutes. i've told the moon
to hold
its blue in deeper. what's soon
unheard is saying. i know,
i said.

11:12pm

Don't wake me. Don't. I'll wake. Me,
I'll wake when time wants me. Time
tells me when is its where. Time waits
me out. I'll find it waiting there.

gripping

i did try. i tried to hold it all,
for all as long as i could. then,
the blood came acrylic. it came
in small, loose drips at first, small
drips of the most vivid red.
stinging hands, shaking hands can't
grip it all. drained, they can't, not at all.

i am what can

i find, and i've found the seconds
stay still, and
they move faster as i count them.
i've counted them
slow and fast. i'll slow them down, and settle
in the middle
of them,
slide in right between them.
in their gaps, i was, and
i am, a wish. i can,
and i will, wish me there,
and wish her,
and him, and her again, all of us
wishes. i wished us
as those wishes spelled out in smiles.
we're smiles
meant to wrinkle, and increase
with that wrinkling. we, as wishes creased
the freckled, and the pale, the mahogany
skin on bridges of noses. we are, we'll be
those wishes written
out in sparkling green,
gray, blue, brown, black eyes. i have,
and we have
sparkled. we sparkle being them, whether
those wishes come true, or whether
or not i am and can be,
and they're all now, the seconds, here with me.

falls falling

this dark-proud night doesn't fall, its partner light
leaves. i did fall, falling into a night
that was hidden. i fell, and i'm falling
toward a too shy infallibility. the failing
light is where sleep loves, but love can't sleep,
not when there's night to break, and light's promise to keep.

dozen-n't

A dozen starlings
dozing in the evening sun
doesn't dare the season's end.

It dozen-n't, dare it,
these dozing within warm pinks
to dream up spring's spry bend.

the light's not

The light's not chasing
tricks tonight, and I'm chasing
it. It's sticking to
the barest white faces, to

fire-escapes' twisted
teeth, to the straight-edge
snarls of brick crevices, and
to the slight, tight cracks beaten

into the jaws of the slick
cement walks. I'll stick
wherever it would, could be,
and I'll fall where it casts me.

ecco

I don't like it
repeating myself
I do like it
repeating others' sounds

This hissing fits
the night's shut eyes
it fits, the hiss,
its missing ears

I won't miss it,
the hiss. Where does the air
slip, when it stops
repeating after me?

night wail

the mechanical night
whale wails its plea. It's wanting
for pale's breaking, weights
to be lifted, when it brakes.

fly on the wall

The fly on the wall
stalled, its small
head pointed
n
w
o
d
,
not to listen in
but to black glisten in
the reflected light,
the wall's, and then fly

dreams

The dreams I dream (when I dream,
and I dream
quite a lot) — dreams within dreams
without dreams —
dream up a dreaming me right down
to the me
I am dreaming, when I dream