YOU THINK YOU ARE SOMETHING
LESS REAL THAN YOU ARE

You put on some new pants. I put
on some sunlight. I put on a coyote. You
put on a bigger coyote. You put on all
of the coyotes! You put on the sand as it flies
beneath your incredible little paws. I put on
rain not reaching the desert. You put on how we
feel sad after this. You put on the sadness. You
put on methods for dealing with it. The sadness tries
to put you on but you say No! You wrestle
the sadness to the ground. You are big and need
large wings. You put on the large wings. You are still
a coyote. You put on the howling. You put on
things that howl back. There is nothing
you won’t put on. You put on the darkness.
You put on some stars and even what
is between them. You put on the moon. The moon
that shines! You put on how we want
to stay here! You put on how we forget where
we were before. You put on the earth how
it cracks. You put on its face when it sees us.

__

WE ARE BOTH SURE TO DIE

Clutching a tiny molten piece
of someone else’s life. I tried sleeping
in a bed made of heavy light. I tried moving
out into the forest where everything
was a deer. Say you will be nothing or
beside me. How best do you correspond
in the darkness of a year? But look the year
rolls over and gives me a new face. Now
you go toward the ocean with a terrible
spirit of discovery. There is getting to know
your body and disowning it. The ocean says you
are not dead. What else did you want
it to announce?

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WE ARE BOTH SURE TO DIE

Without coffee and only very minor explosions
to spell our names. One will actually just be
a bird meeting a clear pane of glass. Fanfare
and various stems of wine. People circulating
in a slow, meaningful fashion around
other people exchanging gifts. One time you
gave me a gift. One time everything
was rare and dispensed in intricate
packaging. One time it was a real accomplishment
to find someone a coat they could wear
into a mountain and its forgiving silence.
But I wore a coat into the mountain
and heard all kinds of secret
mountain chatter. There were no souvenirs
that I could bring you. An example
of you forgiving me is you still writing
a movie about my life. Where I am played
by someone much better looking.
Where you add in a pony as my old
but adventurous sidekick. Give him some lines
of quiet but spectacular regret.

__

If we're both going to die I would like to have a lot of fun now, please, yes, I would like to talk with you a lot.