So many years now
I have lived
in and out of this house
and still when I glance
out the window I mistake
the glowing clock in the tower
for the moon
*
I must admit
I feel fortunate
to live in a corner of space-time
that includes
Fables of the Reconstruction
by R.E.M.
All the world is a bubble
if not for the thin slice of atmosphere
we would be floating weightless
and by we I mean everything you have ever known
inexorably exposed to the sun
reconnected to the elements that created us
so uncreated we could continue
dissociated from the separateness that plagues us
to expand in the ever increasing bubble
of the entire universe pushing into the unknown
which does not exist yet except
in our desire to make ourselves known
not as separate distinct entities
but instead a boiling mass of matter
fortunate to evolve a mind of its own
a syllable starting at the back of the throat
that extends and will not end except for the lips
Seeds at the bottom
of cucumber salad bowl
stirred galaxy forms
Fireworks on TV
take a second to realize
not supernovas
Wait for universe
to reassemble to dark
energy matters
All information
beyond the horizon is
irretrievable
Particles contain
mass although we have to say
we don’t know what gives
If we create it
there is no way to contain
its escape elsewhere
Universe expands
no telling how many more
others there might be
It’s worth finding out
even though we can’t visit
perhaps a postcard
Just like other stuff
we know it when we see it
then it disappears
New Jersey traffic
Lexus jackass on bluetooth
what a fucking putz
*
Cultural critique
only provides more impact
with profanity
*
Disconnected from
any apparent sequence
one moment in time
*
Nostalgia disguised
as unwitting repentance
not quite a question
*
Videocassettes
records and tapes and vinyl
can all still be played
*
Distance between things
can be measured by nothing
so much as itself
*
Compare this to that
to this to that to this to
that is everything
*
Factor of zero
can someone please tell me why
it’s two syllables?
*
Typewriter poems
refashion your brain into
something quite different
*
Probably shouldn’t
use the word ‘thing’ in haiku
not concrete enough
*
Concrete is splitting
and nobody walks around
so nothing gets fixed
*
You must be kidding
month is over already?
here comes another
There is nothing else
that will satisfy—only
doors that lead to cake
Doors of perception
don’t need to be cleansed—except
to make room for cake
I opened the door
the cake lay on the table—
and then it was gone
Midnight, a closed door
really only means one thing—
Someone eating cake
Light in the window
streaming under the doorway
to make room for cake
All the doors are brown
And the sky is cake—I went
for a walk—more cake
There aren’t enough doors
down the hallway filled with cake—
they are occupied
Close door behind you
and I will share a secret—
Here’s my secret cake
So many problems—
many slammed doors in the world
can be solved with cake
I thought I saw Mars
peer through a door in the sky
Nope—it was just cake
Finish the threshold
I am working very hard
The cake by the door
Somehow the separation
enacts as a beginning
neither middle nor end
if we recognize anything
along the way it is happenstance
and nothing more
light breaking thru the ceiling
that nevertheless collapses
leaving you in a state
as much undifferentiated
as something unrecognizable
which is what you were when
you did not have a face waiting
in the wings of the mirror stage
for your line a miscue
that somehow finds a pocket
for god does not play dice
only just to abolish chance
in the midst of something else
was it I who was saying
this feels like something else
do I dare to presume
to start something else by myself
which is a universe after all
Without question
a course for endurance occurs
on the blinding blades of grass
in between back and forth
of unending yield
for immortality means never change
a currency of perpetual birth
can only give rise to answer
with one more slide
into precipitant obsolescence
if one was not there to see
the sun set it will return
waiting for the clock to break again
we will keep the score on our skin
and run out of flesh real fast
When memory becomes
so uncontainable
it turns into present tense
or you wake up thinking of
the dreams you will have
tomorrow night
or you realize the sound
you hear in the distance
is unidentifiable
or the rain drips through
the ceiling unattached
to any normal fixture
or the sky gets born
along with the sea
and everything in it
or you cannot believe
you ever were led
to unbelief like that
or you keep looking
for the word that saves you
when the word is listening
for the breath that saves you
Joshua Keiter 