04: Gossip

As he picked up the form, so gay, his wrist breaking,

didn't everyone hope he'd slept with his sister,

lived in the trees with fairies; wasn't he perfect for that tension of story and politic,

         crossed eyes at the box of male, female, other -

Didn't we hunt with animals, fight at borders, fierce in

that raw-meat passion of predators - drinking to the mating of the bold - dying the next day:

the erect, strong man, the beautiful girl, the boy, the woman, that isolation, the seasons,

the small family,

one bed,

back woods.

Weren't we hoping for Tarzan, red eyes, an albino monster, raised by wolves -

         who carry no shame, judgement, definition for human:

Weren't we all something else before?

Man, Woman,

can you hear the ant at the end of the peony, at the drip of its bud, pinching open the bloom?

Might we all be flowers, each an-other brackish, bouquet of earth colors,

stamens in a cup of soul petals,

an account of our blossoms cast and stomped upon the world;

in so many soils,

the only thing that ever endures, lingers, teaches,

is the prayer our seed is

planted, and will be harvested for love's purpose.

The box is naked, emptiness waiting for a check, a choice, definitions

that cannot hold us -

the flowers that held Buddha in trance