my tongue wanting no part of my brain
I’d launch
a dead bird
from a seesaw
and take
note
the short legs
of exodus
bored as a slaughterhouse
crow / angel
on a skateboard
the bear and the elephant
the last
believers
in the integrity
of suicide’s
memory
/ nothing speaks
to a brother’s
fascination
with stones
/ for light
bend it backward
the baby’s
thumb
a woman places my hand in the stomach of god
as fire
the stickman’s
barber
betrays
my hair
surely the boy should have seen by now his father hit a man. a girl walk in on a television. a bite mark on a baseball. a bug-eyed nurse. a dog on two legs. a god on four. a scarecrow on a diving board. himself as a baby. the band-aid
my dream’s
blindfold.
the sisters compare how many months they’ve stayed pregnant
/ nearby,
a boy
believes
he’s guessed
from no more
than the image
of a swollen
fish
which alien
showed interest
in our
despair /
(I am looking for a place to whip my brother that is not a bathroom)
/ my father
he is waiting
for the price
to come down
on a thing
he says
will prove
theft
has no mother
and forgiveness
no god / as a dentist
dreams
it’s all
in the legs
I offer my shoulder to the mouth of little baby angel-bait. my wife is touching up the secret room we’ve rented for a reptile to display its sadness. I am worried my son sees no point in knowing whether or not a slug heavy enough to snap a mousetrap has died. to be clear, a sound twice as long as my ears made its way to god in the photo god is using.
i.
deep down, I’ve always wanted my brother to knit as if he too would be beheaded
ii.
mother chokes
on the pill
the dream’s
light switch
iii.
I have also seen
the opposite
a ghost
into
a person
iv.
the late swimmer, the fossil
moves god
to brush
kingsoftrain 