I kiss as if some warming stream

still hides my lips, drink

and a child not yet born

tugs at the surface, calls out for tears

--you close your eyes.

What did you think would change

or the cry you never hear again.

It does no good to move my lips.

Red frightens the water

and deep in my throat this lulling

is just more moonlight taking shape

floating under your eyes

--you can still hear one moon

calming the other --don't open your eyes.

My kisses too will clot and be afraid

cling to your lips, to this warm milk

the sky all night breathing in, unable

to drown or alone at the light you heard

only once, not loud, trying again.

*

This ledge and my leather jacket

strung on poles to dry

--always a cross-wind --Hey!

People eat off there!

--my shoulders filling out : a chute

leaning into the sky --Take it easy!

and throws me a map that's empty

though I fold the napkin in half

and half and over the latest cities

--it must be winter

--these stools as if the counter

is still under snow

and my wrists in that flat spin

wrapping, the cup bouncing

--by the time the police arrive

he's showing me the pictures

the counter more curved than ever

the coffee flowing to a free stop.

*

The waves you don’t see anymore

are now these stones, enchanted

and the wind as every potter learns

waits for the water to glaze

tighten to bone and mountainside

–you can use the sea for a cliff

headfirst and already the hardening

–you don’t hear a splash

–the blue smoke from your heels

means you’re still diving

tossing one more dime to fill the spot

with spin or however waves, wing

over wing, thicken, drop as if the sea

needed more altitude and your dime

burning underwater –you don’t know

what the shimmering does

but let two stones bump –a fire

so heavy, bending the horizon

and always your arms overhead, on course

trailing a long, shameless if you were strong

if you were sky, if you could hear.

*

This granite has sea in it, each splash

a bell --water lets nothing forget

and drop by drop even stone goes mad

carves by a small saucer for tears

for the tormented miles away

ringing out --I come to scream

to become a bowl and the white smoke

rising where your lips still drift

under the pounding snow --this stone

has tides in it, smells from rainfall

and decay and your arms too are in my throat

in the distance, in the tightening.

*

A private gesture --suddenly one arm

rolls as if it found the field

could guess where the wind --you

don't see my hand over hand, by instinct

shoving the ground away --it's habit now

--wiping oil leaks

--strapped to a canvas shopping bag

full blown with groggy rags

with dangling countryside --every morning

one arm around this garbage can

calling airspeeds and where in this fuselage

there's some distance left --you