the lives of an anchor

I.

The lives of an anchor,
    five lives that are tethered

To dawn, four that sink
    at half past noon as masks of

Another dawn, appari
    tions, calculated to remember

II.

Read the script of
  Callous scrolls - Brood

Of a languid horror, slim
  Recollection, resonance

Of a collage that flits a
  Bare hark, a bare heart

III.

Augur the 
      Saint; she grows by
      Each measured

Cupful of 
      Taint; the brows of
      Shun hearings

IV.

I have taken the steeple full
  Of bees and

Shown it my way of receding 
  Heaven, and

You respond by flipping this 
  Myth; this 

Reason and variance; towards
  A season

Where hurt meets the creature
  of hurt

V.

The plume of a hair 
The frump of a star

    Give it now an ample
    Push - the plush art

VI.

The tiny mourn
   is an

Outward inner
   seeking - a joy dis -
             membered-

the poetry of everyone

and I laugh with eyes / that have known the brink of tears.

and I know the bells of those eyes / that mix your tears
with
my rest, your lift of sun with my turn of praise, my knot of worn

And that my veins don’t end in me / but in the unanimous blood

And that the reign of doubt mixes / the bells of those eyes
with
my nest, your veins that drip in all the pools, a verity of red

—

Like you I
love love, life, the sweet smell
of things, the sky-
blue landscape of January days.

And my blood boils up
and I laugh with eyes
that have known the brink of tears.

I believe the world is beautiful
and that poetry, like bread, is for everyone.

And that my veins don’t end in me
but in the unanimous blood
of those who struggle for life,
love,
things,
landscape and bread,
the poetry of everyone.
Roque Dalton

Fear de-stills the silence

Fear de-stills the silence
Carved from a necessity that
Remains undisturbed; the
Tilt that is needed, the
Hair that will break the

Camel’s back is late for work. It will attempt resuscitation tomorrow, if there is time.

The cant of resuscitation, the can
not of its vocal refurbished
dusty self – one that is torn from the past, one that
wills to
sieve past its shadow.