a poem of some description

water

1. iliad

my flesh is heavy, heavy like rocks,

my mind as heavy.  each muscle grinds 

another and dust seeps out at the joints,

mingles with the black air, the folds of a still

still cloak, hanging dead to my ankles like

black hair.

i am looking at the mottled red and yellowgreen

of the skin of the pomegranate--how it hangs

so still on the dark stone table and how the

darkness clusters about it, clings to it,

holds it in, floods to it.  

the two or three yellowing leaves 

its stem retains.

i am imagining her smelling it and

pressing red lips to its red skin.  feeling her own lips

pressed to the thick-smooth skin 

against her sharp white teeth.  feeling her own 

pellucid fingers against its breakless husk

and smelling its smell like

water.

wake up, 

wake up, persephone,

bright duskless seedling.

2. odyssey

i hear the winds swirling, sobbing

above in the trees and in the grasses.

as if my dominion were hot like flesh,

unquenchable, veins of

fire running from rock to rock: i feel the rain

pour down on stone, feel it sizzle.

she is pretending she is dead.

she wishes she were dead.

and yet she

grows.

wake up,

wake up, persephone.

3. water

persephone, i may have lost you.

 

there is something in my eye.

you feel the sun--invading.

look where your mother comes,

red rage as full as a poppy.

there is a split.

my head is pounding.

the noise is deafening.

persephone,

i am looking up and six seeds

stain your white teeth.

your eyes are like two stars up deep in the sky.

i am shuddering, shuddering, knowing, knowing

what will be devoured next by that red mouth--

water comes out.

water is everywhere.