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Metempirics: study of concepts and relationships conceived   as beyond and yet related to knowledge gained empirically.  A concept barely construed––  conjugation of roses  essence redolent as champac  the fragrance sacred to Vishnu  protector of the world  A being like you   awash in my consciousness so long  then flesh and bone of presence  enigmatic florescence of conflux  out of angle, stance, sound, and movement   We crush  to that essence  so many bruised petals  from

— For Evan   G. Where will I go in tender sleep? Do the grasses call me back through soil and root, to meet myself before I was called my given name? Does the doorway of my mouth, left ajar, spill my nest of secrets, each strange and hidden symbol released into mother's knowing arms — the gentle rhizomic labyrinth just below?  Do the red-clay aqueducts of my veins become the silver-salt of river silt, savoring each delectable footprint of friends and lovers at play? My laught

Give me the moon, I said. Wisp and drip it down between the clouds. Slide it across my back like a mantle of lilied oil. I have never bathed in moonlight. Never eaten fruit made pale by starlight, popped between my teeth by long-fingered lovers, repentant and returned from prodigal lands. Mind those tender sunned-peach hands. For the shadows beneath my breasts are sharp, as dark as the secret crescent of the waxing moon. Drink to me. Feast at the table of my planted feet. Set

He once said: I’ll be Juliet. The gorgeous party of fall was strained to the end. The lonesome star imbibed Blue Hawaiian moon,  fallen into the river’s delirious embrace.  to retaste tartness of insouciance, he'd never known, but -perhaps- upon Eden. In the pockets of his coat; helpless and sleepless pills, having a feverish fête.  "On one glorious night, finally, I shall depart,"  euphoric Juliet sighed. His dream; a seamless stream of midnight smokes,  a shower of transien

Between the hours of blue heron and red winged blackbird, wade in through duckweed: mosquito larva,  dragonfly larva, tadpoles claiming space near ankles and face the sky.   Savor sacred energy:  light, strength,  source of all food. Migration reminds: go forward with warmth, turn as flowers  following the sun, stop  believing excess holds answers: create space for foundation,  growth: eat that outright,  give song like a bird shade like a bush bathe in flowing rivers,  feet

Upon the knowing horse he rode, paused, and picked a fair but gloomy rose, The color of glass without and of the liquid locked within. The horse of instinct walked in fear. In a dark cave-home he conjured fire And sat upon Eastern rugs and contemplated a vanished world. "Someday the cave will grow into one-thousand chambers!" he mused,  Surrounded by unseen and unknown marvels. A purple glow fluoresced upon his face that turned to meet the source. Waste comes from what was on

i laid down offerings  to a God  who does not speak only watches a witness  to my every  unanswered prayer;  a gaze i once mistook as mercy i learned to worship  the absence of sound,  and sought an offering  worthy of such silence hands cupped, not for blessings, but to gather the drip  of my tears this prayer at last had weight and in my palms i learned its language:  the slow dissolve  of salt on stone the tears weren’t mine anymore they were its holy water   so i wept  no

I.  I am lathered in dirt, but I am not blind.  Like an octopus that sees with its skin,  I see the answers to everything—   There are scriptures written in the soles of people’s feet,  and I’ve seen billions of footsteps;   ones with long, languid leavings  ones with short, skittish scampers,  ones with uncaring cadences,  clearly content to ignore that they carry with them all they seek.  People mistake the eyes as the only organ with the power of sight,  and when the feet

I am a slow, shaking old man, my skin isn’t hanging yet, but it looks like a crepe paper map of someplace like Oklahoma or Idaho. When younger and making acquaintances of learned people, I would ask them what they thought God was - only occasionally was this well received and never reversed. Everyone believes in God, you can count self-proclaimed atheists on one hand. I certainly didn’t want to be thought of as, not afraid to burn in hell, though I wasn’t Of course there’s Ei

When it’s all over, when naked birds with little teeth have drunk their last from the saucers of our hips, whittled thin by the rains of the dying world, will it matter what you did to me, what I did to you? We are now no more separate than  moonlight from sun. Intermingled hopelessly in the slow slough of decay. All our old deeds—whetted each on the other— we have done over to ourselves, passed them back and forth between us like wedding wine, many times, a doomed cat’s crad

This life of separateness may be compared to a dream, a phantasm, a bubble, a shadow, a drop of dew, a flash of lightning. — The...

He came to me, like an old friend. He came to me, like a lover. He came to me, looking for help. Three nights. Endless days. Somewhere...

Last night I saw Jesus in the basilica  a face familiar but unlike  what art or statues show. Yet clear as day  a strong nose, parted...

She climbed into my mouth and   made a pocket, paper thin,  shallow as the envelope at the   back of your books I held her like an idol ...

Figured I had time left; Doesn’t everyone, it seems. Thought I could be deliberate. Consider options, at least. Then they gave me the...

The alphabet is not enough  to convey the complexity of a mind.  Rounded subtleties express ennui  where there should be evocations ...

̶  Jessica Nirvana Ram Like the Madonna in stained glass, I too allowed myself to be broken into blue fractals. I segmented my fingers...

I’m sorry for asking questions a mother isn’t made to answer —spirit or otherwise. So many times I addressed you, Why won’t you let me...

Ancient trees are a dying breed. They are a dying breed because they are steadily going out of existence, yes—but, more than that,...

First, dig a hole no deeper than memory, beneath stones that shudder through flames. Whisper its dirge or invite its misery, and press...