"without any cajoling your animal ascended--"
More Perihelion:
Bob Sward's Writer's Friendship Series
Trees
Deep in the lungs of green, a catch
of knives so sharp-- yet we keep
putting bright things in their hair.
No one talks to them anymore. Thieves
don't come out, no one naps or spreads out
red squares for chicken bits. No, nothing
marches out into the sun after being lost
or led by leopards. A shelter for fat
country beasts that eat themselves--
I don't like it. I see how they're tall
amidst squabbles, or bent low
to catch grave whispers. Waving
dead arms in air they probe
our dark hotels, grow children
close to their feet.
_______________________________________________________________ Raising the Dead
Eating my fish stew, you wiped off
your shoulders as if they were coated
in bog & loam. As if your life
had ended, the fish caught in Hades,
& you were preparing to tumble
down the rough ladder into something
much darker than all of this, when
without any cajoling your animal ascended--
(I feel it at your cheekbone. There, touch it.
Can you feel it too?)you drank the whole bottle,
unlocking the red door to the winds
of lust. This should be enough to blur
all our edges, summon a boat full of angels
loaded with levers, scissors & string.
We'll fashion some kind of pulley to hook
at your elbows, & fly you out of that bed.
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