late parade
in the snapshot
we line up
by age
look sideways
but for a sister
who
at the last second
faces the camera
head on
the world
in one moment
a shudder
of photo op
two-bit cyclone
in the next
a whip
lash of childhood
underfoot
hurled
where the dead
lie uncomposed
at most
illness is
a voracious
guest memory
hops on one leg
from the snapshot
we slip
the future a look
to a certain nobody:
a pair of wingtips is not
a means to fly even if
you are not in love
with the lies of the father
the rain can be taken
for medicine a boy has
seventy-two castanets
such doors seep
light in small doses
flush his golden hands
all incisors & milk
you are unassailable, knobbing up naked, singing
the hills alive, reservoir brimming at your back
best loved & creamy
mindless of cannibals in livery
later, when every
eye is died, triumphant
blood rushes deaf to my ovation
we’re happy enough, most days
the body sere with treatment is fifteen
& yours is nine
what rules you subsumes you
though promise bursts like april dogwood
you artfully bloom,
instead, like yeast
to swell the collapsed skin of him
let sacrifice be flesh alone let the air of a body
never loved enough to be [inside]
wait inert for a late parade
ascending holy
linoleum stairs
you shadow
me like i’m
on my knees
before kiss
before i have
the next adonis
in my lip
line my dark
my breathless
doe eyed brother
i find you wanting
a faithless mouth
always racing
always slipping
a wet fish
to the slap
come a day
i’ll lay
my idolatry
to rest
but the price
of monotheism
is empty rise
r is this passion
play of dumb
