unsteady

1

the foot is unsteady in rain. so I say.
fallen garden
{I love
list of fallen things, wet in the path and the dapple
{I love
of real which the brain in the rain
builds. more to the sides than the up.
more to the sprawl. more.
{I love she who comes deeply in concert with real
an unweeded garden that grows to the wall,
splays and kisses and drops with the old rain.
{love
the foot is the foot of the life gone to rest.
the drag of the grace.


2

I hear myself talking and sometimes the voice
is from elsewhere. I know it
but can’t say.
{certain
sometimes the voice is in place at the edge
of the room or the rose-
stained cheek or the meaning
in early and drifted
{certain
and knowing the fall of the foot is the sound
of the other I come to the place
{the certain
is just outside the gate the old
wood, the long road up
and down.


3

who is it? the slight imbalance says. the tip to the side
of the light and the blocks and chunks and minds
and the falling roller coaster, eight pm
in the vastness. a still small voice in
{graced by fence
gilead, picardy, backyard.
the true real is a slope.
in the dark.
{grace me
now I lay me
down to sleep
and how I limp
this trying dream.
take a little more
off on the right. damn.
take
{again now
down the measure.


4

it isn’t my foot lovely
in the rain light and speckle and slash
of the dripping garden it’s
{cold thump
the foot of the enormous
the tentative foot of the electron the foot
limping slightly and sponging
{gold heart static
in the dream of the movement the bauble
on ankle the columns of trees
at the gate in the dark coming
{bled heart pump
fitting the surface of everything
mapped
{rot beauty garden
to the limping no
fat thought will ever cover
all this jazz.


5

grief is the way of things and the limp is the step
of the waltz. the way of things,
the place and weight and bump and slide
becomes the grief when mind
slips inside. take two minds
and stir. place the eyes
to rise and fall
to music.
halt foot
{rain
and flood of burnished light
is all now. all together now.
a children’s party
comes to grief
too.
{rain lovely
speak to me,
huh?


6

light runs flood
to buttermilk dapple
mole fur jigsaw foot and lightfoot
tread and memory numbered
imaginaries
march to the real music autolite
sparkplugs on parade down
the little fake street.
{get up
my intent is the whole
thing in the one
being.
the trail of the lonesome pine pulling
itself into dawn.
{out of sharpness
all the mountains all the valleys all
the brass beds the pillows
the joinings.
{be gone



7

two three one
and back again. the granular light is
a fiction. how many fictions
to make one real?
maybe gets lost in the scatter of leaves
and of children. but abides. no?
{garden by the sea
every piece of paper rises
in the street.
and the street makes a line for itself.
new moon bounce the paper.
{the zone
last night I woke up and I was huge.
my head taking in the sky and feet
the trails.
and he and she
were real.
{comes and goes
white line cloud in ragged streak
across the deadly steel.
{break


8

progressing on foot as by tongue. the baby
next to me practices sentences as
getting on a train. the little windows,
{tell us your name
the lurches. at the same time he learns
how to get his shoe off . this is the cusp
of human effort. without the shoe
he’ll limp. when he walks, that is.
{coming
the coruscating
effort of poetry
is much the same
which is to say
{fading
an act of most perfect attention in
an absence of words.
9
it is my left foot now
in the buttermilk sky. looks like rain. looks
like look. in the right light
everything looks. when we were
under the oak
{precog
on the big bright hill and the grass was green
and woodpile full of newts I fell
and never came to life again
but touching you.
what
{the pain of the mind is nothing
the hel. the hell. I
dreamed last night and jigsaw light
was everywhere as is. the rain
flares on the windows.
{bruised attention
bruise. bruit. to bruit about, to spread, or
a blowing sound heard over an aneurysm.
hel: Swed. helig ; from hel.
see whole; holi-ly; holi-ness.


9

there is a glitter
knocks your eyes out. spread it is on window soft
it is in rot
of december. the garden.
hear the syntax call the bruisèd
sheep home. bruised drifters, winter soup.
‘I’m lame,’ the woman said and everything
made sense. which is to say
another context
came to be,
as was.
{and not above but all around
musically I call you to
the waltz.
brokenly
I call you to
the glue. dead
I call you out
of name.
{the break of the switch
all around these poems fly
the glit and gleam and glimmer
down
the soft mind fallen footfall in
the garden by the sea.
zone buzzer.
to hiss
like hot iron in water.
{oh what a good boy


10

sometimes I catch the moment it
nestles in my hand between
my fingers see the light
the firefly. the way the light
comes through the fingers. so it is with you, honey.
{go away
the way it is the walk is through
the fade of cells the colors
taking the light to drift. take the light
and drift.
{go away
there’s a map of an odd country and
a blur of sodden and
striated toes and the shifting
of leaves above and slide
below
{numb
everything leans to the left in the garden.
depending.
left to right directional
galaxy. in which.
nova instep falling
down daisy. our first
place has gone
to the single drift
light in
the weather. gray man down.
{come back



11

the problem is
the info is
all about me and I
couldn’t care less. except to the degree. the degree
is latitude, longitude,
and twilight. is there anyone else
out there? is the air so full? do sheep
bleat?
{a place to bed
I could handle now
an hour in a luncheonette maybe, up
on fifth. a clear voice in frost light
comes down the rolling street. tilted to the sky
is big place, big picture
garden with its feet in motion. one line
tow line,
stars in my feet in the wet of
the rot and the buttermilk
sky, old.
{place to walk
what’s his name
is down to what’s
my name?
who fucking cares?
{sorry


12

a broken head rolls down the trees
the street. and branches brush. and winter
blinks in lake, for. gleam again?
where’s this coming from? got feet and a coat
and a broken head.
set of eyes
and tears and long
fucking way to go
if I want to get there tonight
that apple full of universe
and dark, and streaming juices rolling
down the street, too.
{snow and then
wind comes down in broom-stroke
after
glass rail evening sweep and wind
of the first-rate mind.
see it flatten the diagram
and ice the flowing.
cocktail
shaker blues.
{where?
you might think the morning is dark from the clouds,
or you might think the morning’s a come on..
or that maybe the city is buried coming
up through the rolling heads.
you might.
{lost in the starry goose
might might maybe
I limp too, sometimes,
left foot drag
varsity.
{precog


13

out in the dark and the snow this morning I don’t move
slick on the ice I move careful and old
looking, surely, what a
drag, what a memory.
{west end avenue
from the instep where purple-edge galaxy something
jagged jigsaw winter light in dapple
autumn too and sycamore
shaped to the splayed
toes in boot, pussy, barely
living things drifting
in dead, muttering.
{alone in the city
what the intelligence demands
this morning,
is readiness for train
at the station white
smoke. arms of steel.
{the lovely lovely, the throb


14

a numb foot like
a spondee. we all scream. in this light
the walk to distance is lacy
and fitted together
with dowels. ice and snow and dark and black
ocean, dull gray bowling alley
sky. roll the pearl in the huge channels.
how deep is the gouge of the river?
this is a madman’s landscape
{what’s it to you?
and it comes to a flight of stairs. that’s
the palladian version. the arcadian comes
to the opening ramp and the grove where the old
man sits and watches
the ghost horizon.
{all things come
if I’m sorry what does
it matter? all the world requires is
you die successfully. this is what I say
to the shadows
when they take the light and bleed it
toward me. left foot numb, a tri-
spondee. beautiful dreamer
waken to me
{all things feel