Tensely
premenstrual and
looping the fall moon
I am seriously
deranged yet
curiously
in possession of
all my faculties.
Consumed by
feeling for you
biology stands on its head.
What is instead
consummate
in this desire is
I’m seriously
dispossessed.
1996
Six other sons, and yet
I know precisely the last pull of pain
when you came out of me,
feet first, each pressured, released,
and the wet, warm slither down
the drain of life.
It was the last time we touched.
You sailed beyond me,
bearing only your name.
From your glass shell, a small fist salute,
the final white box your one flag.
All you left, breast full, blood heat, the bluish milk,
fell in the void of your leaving
and destitute, my arms raged.
Such a little life,
twenty-six hours long.
Such a sore tide,
the same in years, still rising.
Time can’t heal the hollow that never held you,
your absence is as a fresh wound, widening,
the salt in it your name not said.
1996
Ye hae tae feel it.
It’s hingin in the air.
Nae wind tae steer things up.
Nuthin movin.
The animals ur quate.
The burds peep but dinnae squawk.
The gress an trees an bushes bide at peace.
Watter in the burn gaes by,
slaw slippin ower the stanes wi haurly a wrunkle.
In the seas, the watter lies
like gless that micht shatter.
Even the staurs ur staunin stull.
The wurld haudin its braith.
Waitin while sun an earth
staun at thur furthest pint.
Aw life thit needs the licht is waitin.
Watchin. Kennin thur will hae tae be
a comin back, a new beginnin,
ur the daurk wull never luft
an awthing living wull end this nicht.
Dae ye no feel it?
2000
ur: are
quate: quiet
gress: grass
haurly: hardly
wrunkle: wrinkle
pint: point