The Enigma of the Hour
The trouble I was in heard me cry,
made a radiant animal leap —
a white tail flipped, deep-wood seeking.
I walked and saw a stir
around a church, the sound of dolor
ringing. Whatever walked there before
had burnt its tracks black.
From the vestibule a stoked heat
smoldered and smoked.
I pulled on the large rings, hard,
opened the corrugated iron doors.
Inside the nave, a paper funeral
fluttered, flimsy as newspaper.
Cut-out mourners, folded at the back
around a coffin filled with tissue. No
hands of flesh to grasp and shake, no
quiet nod and step away. No.
All had gone to what they were
and paper dolls stood in their place.
The fire raced across the floor,
the figures caught and swayed,
their faces shrank in a blank gaze.
The coffin without a body blazed.
* * * * *
Elegy for Rabbit
The cops placed his body at our door —
Hopped to the wrong town. Sorry.
We enshrined him, embedded him,
made a fucked-up tableaux of him.
His room, still with a made bed:
Writing desk. Jackknife. Photos
turned against the wall.
You, prone on the living room floor.
Me, bent over a sink.
We leak and wipe our faces.
We are uncontrolled and ruined.
You disappear in archways, appear
on thresholds trying to stop me
from carrying the sorrow I carry
from room to room. I can see yours.
I look into your eyes,
into a river of rabbits.
Their parts float by.
Where is the face of him.
Where is the foot of him.
The corpse-cold fur of him.
The flat-back ears of him.
His eyes like black stones.
When you kneel I look down,
see the candle lit in your skull.
I kneel with you, but we haven’t a prayer.