Because the cathedral leaked yellow light

onto cobblestones like a slit carton of milk.

Because boxes of red wine emptied

down the throat’s swiveling street.

Because the music of my footsteps

like notes of ash.

Because he curved like a question mark

puncturing a flap of heaven.

Because litros tucked in brown paper bags,

two packs of Chesterfields a day, 

at the breakfast table, 

on the lip of a balcony.

Because I woke in a shrine   

of my own stickiness.

Because his lips were aperitif.

Because my father kissed his forehead 

outside the mosque,

the taste of rum and rose petals. 

Because oranges bulging in coat pockets.

Because the condom held against the light,

swirling cities of children we would never conceive.

Because it broke,

the cartography of longing pulsed onto soft thigh.

Because the long walk home chaperoned by stray dogs,

the drunk’s grief of the Guadalquivir,

blue cough and jasmine rotting in my hair.

Because I passed out in the bar bathroom

and mistook the toilet for my mother’s legs.

Because the shard of glass in the singer’s throat.

Because he cried when he was happy.

Because the thief looked me in the eyes and didn’t take the purse.

Because the petroglyphs of our hands wounded the white walls,

how we made the world small,

siphoning god’s breath 

to sweeten the blood-flavored noon.

Shall I tell you, then, how it is?

There came a cloven gleam,
Like a tongue of darkened flame,
To burn in me.

And so I seem
To have you still the same
In one world with me.

In the flicker of a flower,
In a worm that is blind, yet strives,
In the mouse that pauses to listen,

Glimmers our
Shadow as well, and deprives
Them none of their glisten.

In each shaken morsel
Our shadow trembles
As if it rippled from out of us hand in hand.

We are part and parcel
In shadow, nothing dissembles
Our darkened universe. You understand?

For I have told you plainly how it is.

one year, i carried the blues around
like a baby. sure, my coffee mugs cupped

amethysts :: water gushed, rose-tinted
and -scented, from the faucets at my touch ::
the air orange with butterflies that never

left me. meanwhile, indigo held fast
to my toes :: lapis lapped my fingertips ::

and a hue the shade of mermaid scales
bolted through my hair like lightning.

my eyelids drooped, fell, heavy with sky.
that year i carried the blues around

left me mean :: while indigo held fast,
the daily news tattooed azure to my back. 
true, festivals of lilies buoyed me. but what 

good could white do? the blues grow like
shadows in late sun :: stretch  creep  run.

A tryst.
That ends
in a nightly dose.

A contradiction,
emptiness
refused by starlight,

the dark
enflamed with error.
Tell me again

what crime you are
so guilty of?
The hot tub,

26 Seconal—
the moon
like ejaculate.

Delicate.
Poor
Barlow,

you felt
so alone;
you were

the only queer.
January 1, 1951.
In the semantics of

your translation
you intend, in Náhuatl
a long while,

to abandon
your cadaver.
There.

My old lover was Catholic and lied to me about the smallest things. Now he's dying and I'm trying to forgive everyone standing in line ahead of me at the grocery store. I keep painting objects intuitively. I keep saying I've never been in love. It's not quite true but I keep describing the same things differently, as sailboats through the locks of reversed rivers or as streaks of red across the sky, visible only in one eye. The sensation of decision-making won't stay put. I forget who I am and wake up exhausted. I had a teacher once who died, it was as if she removed herself into the forest. I scatter leaves to read them like pages as if she's speaking. She was in love. I don't know if I'm worried I will or won't ever give up my fictional autonomy. I'm choosing between two trees with two hollows. One begins breaking as I step inside, as I try to sleep. The other is already inhabited by a rooster. I pluck a feather and run to the pawn shop. How much is this worth? Can I buy it back for my Sunday best, for the suit I never wear? Maybe if I go to the church I don't believe in I'll meet a man I can. I'll wear my Jewish star and pray for his belief to convince me that I too want someone to hold my stare.

Dream on, for dreams are sweet:
     Do not awaken!
Dream on, and at thy feet
     Pomegranates shall be shaken.

Who likeneth the youth
     of life to morning?
’Tis like the night in truth,
     Rose-coloured dreams adorning.

The wind is soft above,
     The shadows umber.
(There is a dream called Love.)
     Take thou the fullest slumber!

In Lethe’s soothing stream,
     Thy thirst thou slakest.
Sleep, sleep; ’tis sweet to dream.
     Oh, weep then thou awakest!

I got out of bed
on two strong legs.
It might have been
otherwise. I ate
cereal, sweet
milk, ripe, flawless
peach. It might
have been otherwise.
I took the dog uphill
to the birch wood.
All morning I did
the work I love.
At noon I lay down
with my mate. It might
have been otherwise.
We ate dinner together
at a table with silver
candlesticks. It might
have been otherwise.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the walls, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.