may summer come

This is the sunfield--

Dried oatmeal left by the kitchen cleaner

Beneath a heavy blue flame;

The unrecyclable literature of a middling

Candidate sprawled across the mudroom floor

Beneath bike tires and beer kegs;

Mice at the corner of my vision

Flitting out of boredom, out of fear

That comes with days like this,

That there will only be days like this.

Sweat and no blood,

Sweat and no tears,

Planning and no action;

The bickering of organizers over

Whether you can say that to their committee,

The dried red crust of garlic sauce on a green spigget;

I am coming for you middling America,

With your dried bones you keep for medical powder

And your holy wars fought with human resources.

I am spray painting my skin for the high

And using my nakedness to collect

stories of your sexual exploits.

We are in the brown backyard together,

Watching the piles of dead leaves bake.

We are paying too much attention

And believe me, I am going to ask you

About this later.

Because it’s my fault we sit

At $13 wine bars and create

sporadic monuments to our intentions.

Perhaps that is what I do now.

It is my fault I am tying to enter into a cool room

Filled with silence about the things that turn us on,

Turn our bodies and souls on like tiny bulbs

Along a cosmic string.

This is the sunfield—

Bleached and bland,

Overstimulated and homogenous,

Bright, bright, and flat.

Where are you in this sun?

What color do your eyes change

And how do your muscles pull you up?

What memory comes with that hint of breeze?

What are the words to that song?

Tell me how you love yourself, even now.

I see you growing like a universe,

Circling like the ocean.

How do you stay quiet with all that inside?

Where have you been?