blindfolded
the whole city mouth stuffed with
violent asphalt
the drag of lives soon swallowed whole in the night
-but see the bits of life caught on the edges
hung loose in the maw.
tied to these teeth, these knives that cut sharp are not that, only blunt
they are, these knives only blunt sawing through bodies should
abeen buried all those moons that come and go ago.
-in pieces night badly pasted screeches along.

this flat black sunken death comes
over night lost in these lies where no stars stutter warmly.
no eyes alive patched on faces where they should be
that is on shoulders looking at other faces
all with holes drumming their routine rhythm
those wholes moving words spilling out over the patches
with wandering white moons hysterical in the everyday
pain, the angles scared into claustrophobia.

the hesitant fingers of unbroken trees fight
for space while the rest wither
with their wounds stacked on
backs bent, sloped shoulders where comes the broken limb
with burning song desperate for recognition.

and smoking and smoke crawling up and in and in, phantom
probes, this smoke from holes that scream blacking
and blueing without think,
without thinking they slip into emptiness.
and smoking they smoke, but never burn and this does not move
all of them lying standing sitting drinking themselves
this air goes over here and there around and around
snaking over and under clattering in the void.
this is not art
these apart pieces that scream
but no waves no ocean of sound to walk ears no things burn this
night is a lie the city a graveyard unmarked doesn’t mean
not broken
when I cried and when I didn’t
your death an open wound on the skin of my consciousness.