brant goble

* 

My hand struggling inside this tiny fish

makes a place --you won't believe it!

 

I can hear my hand along my arm

gutting that still warm evening

--even now, as we talk, each heartbeat

cries upstream for its mother

leaps heart over heart, heard its name.

 

You're nervous. I can tell.

You always come to the shed like this

throwing its screendoor over the table

over the belly --I'm making room

 

for the world, for the tears that cover my body

--I can't breathe --quick! take my arm

this time deep enough for two

and waves leaving the sea forever.

 

                        did you think would change

or the cry you never hear again.

It does no good to move my lips.

 

Red frightens the water

and deep in my throat this lulling

is just more moonlight taking shape

floating under your eyes

--you can still hear one moon

calming the other --don't open your eyes.

 

My kisses too will clot and be afraid

cling to your lips, to this warm milk

the sky all night breathing in, unable

to drown or alone at the light you heard

only once, not loud, trying again.

 

 

* 

Its light can't reach, let go

and what once was a wooden table

is lips and your arms

 

--I rattle this bulb, listen

for where the wood overflows

bailing out, cup after cup

 

splashing, wiping, erasing

then weeping again --the tree

is too heavy, the table can't move

 

and my breath that once boiled

from kissing your breath on the throat

--this table's darkness can't reach either.

 

Or the sun lifted out in the open

--this light once too sharp

still empties, shapes from the table

 

this mask with holes for my eyes

and the Earth --it does no good

to replace the bulb

 

or cover the table or bed

against the frost --what helps

is the listening, is the withered table leg

 

tapping the bare floor

for footsteps

and easy touching home.