REMEMBERING THE JUNGLE
If we could only
Remember how the
Words worked, the ones
That helped change the seasons
So that no one would notice
Until time itself had piled
Up snow or leaves or
Rain upon rain into the center
Of a month, but we
Could not. Here faces were burned
Off, limbs were regarded
As cord wood, milk spilled
From mouths. We could not
Begin to disguise our disgust
Of the shape dreams made
On the walls of our villages.
Someone said the wands had been
Taken from the area long ago.
Still, we could see lights in the jungle
Night occasionally. They were music.
They were our voices.
We thought they were our homes on fire.
A MORNING FILLED WITH ROSES
Bullets dream the taste of flesh.
The parting of the skin to red
Fountains and the splinter of bone.
Saints speak with tongues made of fire.
The names of God split with desire’s
Sweet tooth pulled up against the spine.
The night is away from home.
I have seen where it goes,
How it borrows morning
From the dream. Listen to this wind.
It clots just below the sky,
Squats on the tops of hills,
Staring down at its own rivers
Deep, like blood.
Look here. A hand dips down
Into a palace of feeling.
Perhaps it is someone loving someone
We might not have noticed except
That the hand squeezes drop after drop of blood
From the wells from which we drink.
This kind of language is full of pretty
Things like this. Come out here with me.
The sun seems about to move from
Behind those trees, to wake up the birds.
If we are so perfect just this once
We can watch the bullets pick their way
Through the body. The smell of gunpowder
On the air. A morning filled with roses.
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