Little soul lost, little shining ghost, prepare yourself to descend
into the small chambers that flicker like fireflies. Prepare cattle
& rapid fire which should be the pallor, tenderness of patient flowers.

I want to tell you about my childhood, ten times the nerve, which is
stitching darkness, which is mine alone tattooed, black as the black
craters in an isthmus, worse than the worst mind during the war
deranged, always the strange order of smoke, always in praise
of the elder tongue, which I’d like to think, is afraid of the dark forest
of trees. But never mind all that, how it mocks what is & what is not.

All the while I didn’t know when I claimed you my apostrophe
I meant an adagio with ink, meant dead ringer in the wind, but worst.

What remains is this deer at the edge of the woods, my dappled antlers
my toiled meaning & no meaning making music like a heretic. After all
what is a soul crawling out of the black dirt if it has no teeth or nails.