The Language of Art (Plunderverse Poem #5)

The Language of Art

language is intelligent, idiosyncratic,

                                passionate

                             a life's work                                      elements of

                       a seemless

                                   entity

                                                the artists' own words

                            the language

keening, strident, warlike, seductive

                                   celebratory

                                    sustained

                                                              provocations, flashes

fragmentary

                                         profoundly awake

                                   eyes open

seizing the light

working under cover of darkness

                    

                            obscuring darkness

Fall Haiku

The last leaf whispers

"I want to stay with you, Tree"

Wind has other plans

~

I am the last leaf

I am always the last leaf

Until Wind finds me

~

The last leaf trembles

"Goodbye, Tree, until next time"

Wind comes out to play

Zombie Self-Portrait (Plunderverse Poem # 4)

Zombie Self-Portrait

I remember the first year art had changed

the art making happened in the neglected rental

with strangely shaped rooms and walls

crawling with words 

and mysteriously the electricity was spotty

crackling, black-stained extension cords

ideal for her plans

astral abstractions on canvas and paper

graphite greys and jaundiced yellows

a figure made of nightmare

early evidence of zombification

long tresses of hair and insects

jellyfish sacs and vermin

snakes for flesh 

surrounding a grinning set of human teeth

dumpster-dive faces,

masks of mess

black hole covered over 

with an aggregate of natural wonders

and street horrors

Stories

Building storeys
lines of text, layers
of sedimentary rock
of sentences building an edifice
of a tower of babel, skyscrapers built on air

sand castles of stone

Stories are set in stone
until they grow wings
and shatter the sculpture block

We tell ourselves stories
to make sense of the chaos
around us, within us
to throw meaning against the wall

We store parts of ourselves in our stories,
like squirrels store nuts in their cheeks
and forget where they buried them

stored inside a vessel,
an amphora of oil
secure for millennia
in Socrates’ grave

keepsake in a sealed jar,
a boat built inside with delicate
precision
set adrift on ocean waves

seagulls have stories
they keep to themselves
swooping to peek through
smudged glass

Refracted stories
ride infrared waves beyond vision
distort memories
light up recesses and buried treasure
cover like a down duvet
goose flesh across your arms as you hear a story
[refracted]
hitting its mark on the tender spots you pretend don’t hurt

Picture frames
expensive and heavy mounted on walls
to showcase that you’re worthy
of oak

Framed like pictures snapped on iPhones
filtered for effect
Clarendon & Juno
to manicure our moments



stories built up in sediment