Fallen Angel

After Jean-Michel Basquiat

Blue, what could be sky

unknotted—bluer even

than a lake shuffling

into the lungs,

and the lungs forgetful

of self, a blackness

that tars every inch

of inside. Therefore,

my inside is mysterious.

My wings want to blossom

and ask: Am I still wings?

There are mammals

that can’t be named.

A violence. A sex

without erection.

Eventually, I’m without

closure—transparent.

Anything can fit:

a heart, a bird, a second penis.

There is a mouth

I call mine but given

to the wind: red

how blood is red

when it frees itself

from the I. Today,

the I is master: a horse

with wings that pearl

when the blue sky lathers

and the horse emerges

through the clouds,

the clouds sifting

the faint hairs like waves

before the horse

collapses against the shore,

tired from being horse,

howling—the legs howling—

Amputate me.

Yet, I am no horse.

My eyes sink

into the skull

behind the jelled sphere

like a snail vanishing

beneath the sand.

Look at all my colors.

What my body takes.

The sun crystallizing me

into a fossil.