Euclid by Night
High schools from the 1960s
with corridors and no front office.
Wayward homesteads, wing by wing,
wandering the generations.
Hotels where the toilets prove
extremely hard to find.
Who are these architects of strangeness,
these deep-sleep, wild geometers
who’ve yet to hear of Euclid?
Who was it said we must forego
the certainties of sunlight?
A Twinge
A twinge, a twitch, a dizziness,
short-lived and disconcerting,
a harbinger — but not enough
to contemplate the doctor.
It happens at a concert sometimes.
Would the players pause awhile
to see me carried out?
I think of those capillaries,
the traffic in my head,
so unendurably complex,
contorted, wet and fragile.
How is it they’ve survived
so many seasons now?
One flash of summer lightning,
is that how it’ll be?
A sudden, final whiteness,
no decibels — or rain.
And sometimes too I think of vealers
herded up a crush,
the hammer-gun there raised and waiting,
the steel bolt through the brain.