Whenever they do it
it is dark and they move swiftly.
They do their work
as carefully as artists.

Whoever they are
they go for the intimacies first,
removing lips and tongue,
eyes, the heart, the anus and the genitals.

Whatever they leave behind
is lucky. It’s left alone
by scavengers and other beasts.
Its neighbors low and scoot away in fear.

However they do it
they do it without shedding blood.
They do it without leaving
a signature.

Wherever the body is finally taken to
and burned, the grass will not grow there
for a long time to come. When it does,
the living will have to decide whether or not to eat.

Ever so, ever will be:
mysterious dead left behind,
perpetrators gone, survivors shivering,
body by the wayside, spring on the wind.

Faith says Facebook does a body good.
All that contact does the job, all that
rubbing against your privacy wears off the rough edges.
Pretty soon you’ll be smooth, and no one will know you.
Then the offers will come in, once you’re
superficial. Once that happens you can find a friend
who’ll be salty when you’re salty, sweet when you’re sweet.
It’ll be something else, you’ll want to roll in it
as if it were a sugar scrub.

Faith tells this to everyone. The world
revolves and the names you’ve borne go with it, sliding
across the surface of things until they strike against people
who think they once knew you. They’ll drop a line
and you’ll respond and Faith will be proved right, as she always is,
as you desperately move your bumps around until they mesh with theirs.
Everyone’s getting smoother these days. Everyone’s a matter of fact
until they’re called on their history, and then
the tumbling begins: you’ll make yourself shiny,
tell yourself that this time
it’ll work. The past is past until it strokes you
and you bloom like a supermodel, like a genie
looking for wishes to toss away.

Give me a key. Any key
will do — long old time skeleton, short
cylinder for a chemical cabinet, an
ordinary key
with ordinary teeth. I will take it home,

I have a door that might be perfect for it.
Maybe your key will work,
maybe not.
If not, I’ll add it to the pile
that’s rising in the corner.

If by chance it does
turn, if the metal inside
slides aside and the handle moves,
I’ll let you know. I’ll wait for you
to come over and you can watch me go in —

crawling into the tiny chamber
I’ll bruise my head but it’ll be worth it.
You can hand me all the keys once I’m in,
even the one that did the trick,
and close the door

once that’s done. You can walk home
knowing I’m safe, a little headachy maybe
but secure behind the door that was closed for so long.
It’s all I’ve ever wanted —
my own place, somewhere

I fit; somewhere
I could nurse wounds
old and new until I was either
satisfied with them or they faded away.
(I do not expect them to fade away.)

You’ll get home and open the door to your place
with the key you always use. You’ll sit on the couch
and wonder how I’m doing in here, now that you’ve gone.
It’s like this: I’m not unhappy. I’m just another guy
wondering how I got here. I’m fine, all things considered.

sorting it out today, wondering
how much of what I have believed
about myself and who I am
is so much plastic wood

I fell in love early with “assume a virtue if you have it not”
assume a story if it works
assume a face that bears your chosen hue
assume there are those who won’t look past it

but somewhere in my true wood
there are knots and burrs
and I can’t veneer them enough
to leave no lumps in my surface

even when I dare to touch
the places I suspect they are
I can kid myself into the thought
that it’s my fingers that are suspect

but the ripples I refuse to feel
are there even if I cannot admit
that they are — all those years of covering
all those years of making it up as I went

and when the day comes to strip away
the last pieces of the fake decor
what will I say to myself when I look at the gnarling
the burls and the wormholes and the split grain?

will I say then i was a beautiful man
or will I despair and wail as I light a match
assume the peak of a pyre I should have built long ago
to watch myself fall in upon myself

instead of assuming that a life of wounds and scars
was less valuable than a life of obvious subterfuge?
will I tell myself I was dead either way
and let the wreckage show at last?

In a spotlight every facial expression looks deep. Bring it!
I can count three minutes off in my sleep. Bring it!

Give me a place to stand, and I’ll stand there.
As I sow, so shall ye out there reap. Bring it!

What I have to say needs to be said.
It’s mine to offer, yours to keep. Bring it!

If I move you, you’ll tell me so.
This is the moment: I breathe before I leap. Bring it!

I lay the words out faster than I thought I could.
Every moment of my life is at your feet. Bring it!

Numbers mean nothing beyond the moment.
I am the only poet I need to beat. Bring it!

This is the truth I was born to tell.
I am the vessel for the change I seek. Bring it!

I am the only thing I know perfectly.
I wrote this poem because I can no longer weep. Bring it!

When the moment’s over, I breathe again.
Somewhere, but not here, evil still sleeps. Bring it!

Poetry’s the point, but not the only point.
Any poem may slay the strong, save the weak. Bring it!

Next poet come up and does it all again.
This is the staff of our lives; come and eat. Bring it!

——————————————-

and now, back to the stuff I write for money…

Water cuts rock all the way downhill
with no strain on itself.

Wind turns leaves all at once,
or do the leaves turn themselves?

When the moon moves the ocean
the earth changes without troubling itself.

Wool grows long. We feel the need to shear it.
Before we saw them, sheep governed themselves.

Walls and bridges rise and obscure the fact
that there was no need for them till we troubled ourselves.

What does the tree feel as it grows?
Nothing, it tells us. Is there a truth it keeps for itself?

When I imagine peace in the center of this
I am happy enough until I notice myself.

When I dream, I break a sweat. Water
runs down my face. Wind cools me. I reproach myself.

Willing as I am to be still at the core, I cannot be
the wind and wave without rejecting myself.

Why not, then? Why not turn my face from working
toward the path of no effort? Why not be myself?

When I sit with that, I feel unloved.
I will not enjoy myself.

When I work, I feel removed.
All day, I remove myself.