Poetry
four
REVERSE ENGINEER
The measure of a fence
is its definition;
of my mind, its mark
in the mouth, mirroring
alluvial fans of my face.
What kind of document
is a photo of a map?
Whether I’ve seen a thing
whose word I’m unsure of—
say, a pergola—it’s practically
certain, but I’ve never put
“oblivion” in a poem before.
All this time I didn’t even notice.
Took almost forever,
pretty much everything
(the pickets are listing)
what I am used to
being broken.
DUPE
Two precepts of artificial
intelligence on television:
never show a computer
its code; and the more
a robot understands, the less
likely it is to know
it’s not real.
I am nothing if not
aware the self is made
the shape that explains it—
the purpose of living
is to keep alive
what I should know
I should know.
UNI-BOMBER
Cut the wrong wire
and the timer turns back
to time (all of it
and we are coeval,
now more than ever).
Space is no better—
everything the case
is a trompe l’oeil stage
with real light on it.
Pantomime silence.
A poem is a robotic arm
feeling its way in the dark.
OUT OF LOVE
Cross my hands,
close my lids,
float me down
on a raft of lashed
limbs. No.
Caterpillars
feed on receivers
of sun and other
limbic influence.
Summer sounds
ceaseless. Night
blooming black
paper trees
pasted to blue—
I’m only playing
dead to you,
a strike-anywhere flame
waiting for fuel.