The pentametric voice—it can oppress.
A sonnet speaks to timelessness,
but you and I have less
breath and time
than this.

Though, might my private penitence outstrip
the wave-crest of this sinner’s mass,
till you, dear dog-ear-maker,
bless my soul
at last?

Each utterance must be a kind of test.
Will the blood that blooms the words
touch your blood, raise
your pulse, flood
your face?

Or else there’s no confessor knows the taste,
the color of this vagrant’s rage
to touch, and touch remains
an isolate’s
disgrace.

The tan hills west of here turn black, a hundred
backs of sullen beasts, beneath
a sky gone red, a burning
page where longing’s
bled.

Then dark again, toward another brightness,
desire’s face—the sun’s and ours,
the rumpled bed’s, the trampled
field’s, its shreds
and buttons.

Your eyes collect the ink. You thought you’d find
a tonic for duress—instead
your nostrils take the stink
of the uncomposted
dead.

You’re not born yet. I’ve been distributed.
You rise from dirt, your own fresh urges
spread, sweet as cow’s breath,
out across
the earth.

And you’re my hope. You salivate and flush
to see your first love’s breast. You clench
and curse, jealous. Hence,
you offer this ghost
rest.