for Terence Roberts ( Gt : In mem.)
They containerd the axis : the sorrow once shared
what the gap through paling, speck on the horizon
plied . now roll call; the über blood carriers ‒ all
the Sign in gates flocked out; trapped so, we didn’t
no! we didn’t know.
Days stalled long, man ! dawn cleans no farther;
shirt tail dinosaurs can’t change the code; trails
Search log the missions row till river mists lift
Run the risk mind . strip climb Kaie’s gold ladders.
Guardians faith empties fill with bubble blowing
drills . as sweaters peddle beads for desert night
sky miracles : the Thirst on knees relieved.
Scan the homage
late models : ship coordinates for swim eyes only
up welling seas.
Which is what sent our arcs in orbit : now where
were we ? not always there, for all the lush land
rover dust . haze slow to settle.
Off again from flood ‘n’ fire
news rafters pole, reach shores no safer . bets even
rust red terrain egg planting.
Tag played ~ we’re it, man,
kind of planet puzzlers ~ to stay awake for ? what
on earth remains.
The apple Adam
bite Eve scene ? Hurry! can’t be late for that shoot.
– W.W.
MARA
*YET self-exhausting Mara is reluctant
To bury the corpse to whose dying breath she,
As its witness, has become hooked, like a fish
Resisting a taut line tugging it up towards light,
Up to its last chance to become more than fish
Through glad surrender of its accustomed flesh
In service to the changes of other flesh.
*SHE now fondly recalls Sun-Dung ‒ her fellow
Corpse she sometimes called by that last name he loathed:
He claimed his mother Else marked him with it, less
To invent his father than to slot her child-fadduh,
The man that got away and perhaps never
Was, as the Gershwins and Gloria Grahame knew
(Else craved chocolate but needed chocolate-box art.)
(from “Charon’s Anchors” by Brian Chan, 2018)
FARJOURNEY CARIBBEAN 