times
(for stephen todd booker)


'o boy . . .
the pipes, the pipes

are calling;
and i'll be

in sunshine
or in shadow;

i am dead,
as i may well be.'

god is my judge,
gingerly finishing touches
on a cherry pinocchio.

wink.
in the slammer
for twenty-five years . . .

an inversion
of dominant civil-
i
-zation. or,

a reflect
-i-
on.

invisible
man,
easily
mistaken

for zero—
once, twice,
three times . . .

feeling,
falling,
filling
a hole
the hollow of
your primordial zoo; pacing

up & down in the cage;

beating off a soft chest.

-suede smooth;

cool handed, warm hearted;

blood
on jean cocteau's
miraculous tub of mercury,

'the descent in oneself is a way of holding
to that mechanism of dreaming, without sleeping; using a crooked candle, which mysteriously may be blown out as it's carried about in the night of the human body.'

locked, with
negative defenses.

it flutters, is caught
in a structured tangle.

spider/
red sip.

incest
insect;

not cricket, but
—all things great,
or small, being equal—

your crimson, scar-
let, underbelly of a mother.

the coming
menstruation;

release . . .
hemorrhage.

unwashed brother
dark inside the white;
telephone calls held.

numbers
on the double
-helix of some malcolm x timeline:

with years against him, his
sentences were commuted
to six, in prison.

the 12 years,
7 months after
of revolution, and
transubstantiation.

transmogrify . . .
water turns to wine.

franciscan nightshade;
do bed, st. hook, repent.

pity
the appealing

kid. id, please;
whitman as a vampire.

porfiria.
pair of i.

your sonar in foggy oxygen . . .
sound is loud, with rag ears on;

striking a match
& flicking cigarettes.