Spectral Peaks
I.
Dear eyewitnesses, there are 37 flavors of death.
Society writ large, this is our penultimate raindance.
(The next will be not for ceremony)
There is a structure here that is somehow
broken.
II.
When I dream itโs of an albatross
or a boat wreck
never anything on TV. Iโm wandering an abandoned presidio -
the word for it is narcotized
(blame is a concept I canโt get far enough away from)
- and of a river, I dream: The Cerulean
(I donโt know what else to call it)
because it is blue. It hides my body like a dominatrix.
III.
When I was young and scared I searched for Porsches
(I memorized their places)
The radio was fixed in time and in favor of Bonnie Raitt, sounding both
far away and close. Or maybe near the newspaper plant.
Creeks surrounded everything, like quiet talking. With houses
set back from the road.
And now, let us talk of dead bodiesโฆ
IV.
Dressed in rose patterns, she came to the top of the stairs, saying
โit is going to be horribleโ
The fluorescence of childbirth shown through my skin
praying for the funeral to have pastries after.
The saccharine rain was wrapped in distance. The asphalt
smoked and smelled of inside not out.
The black crows were eating the road.
V.
I watched you sleeping, I watched you lain there on pink clouds full of
meaning.
No talking.
Outside drove the whisper truck. The whole world
was remembering. Circling a scent.
Wishing for something rain-like but not rain. Something
soft but no longer bluish.
VI.
When the Minotaur finally fell I felt no
sadness, wanting something
to touch that could somehow still touch back.
Like the first time I felt flesh, held it there. And all
that was inside it. Right after then, when it
vanished, and all I knew to do was
to want it back again,
as if after forgetting.