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Blue Irises
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I wanted to mouth you all over
spring clouds spring rain spring
tenderness of afternoons spent
blazing trails to this
place where breath roars through
the famous architecture of a poet’s ear
Rose and peony buds and tongue
ichthyous tumble honey and pearl—
the runner’s foot has touched and adored
wistaria sprang after you, figs tipped
green air astounded by your passage
to the audient quays of the city
Now it begins, another voyage after nemesis
blue-eyed with the distance of it all
2
I didn’t know about this passion
for oh she is also mine
delirium tympanis from the Portuguese
wind in her hair alongside us here
on the deck unhidden she slows your reading down
Fine ground darkness pours into the vessel
beans and flowers adorn the fall—
ichor! ichor! drink to the eyes locked on yours
the mouth that smiles and will speak for itself
I have always done the talking and she
put the words in my mouth saying do melisma
like sunlight be melisma like no sunlight pressed
redness before dark print an iris on her
& do melisma like sunlight astir oh & os etc
3
From the corner of this mouth take
kisses that begin in moonlight
and pitch slow fire over a history of you
reeling in the universe Rhapsode
you and I have some walking to do, some
stitching together of the story so far, its feat
of silence, of sleeping lightly and listening
for the touch that outstrips all sense
in the hour before dawn Look we have come
to the walled garden See how the roses burn!
The lovers in the fountain spoon each other up
their drenched talk stretches the library resources
and when pubis and jawbone snick into place
you face my delight an uncontrollable smile
4
Honeyed learning! I traced her once
to an island in spring, pointilliste mouse-ear
drifting down the margins Then she was
phlyctena in the eye of the sea-ear reworking
a disturbance in my name I found wild choral
allusions and scents that drew a white bee
to not-madness in the folds of her blue gown
This morning the whole world is wet wistaria
battered gutters running and everything drowning drunk
extends a big hand for the reprise
Which comes Up the road on small trees
is a honey blue inflorescence I can’t name
When the gardeners say cyanotis trust your ears
though rain fall into an open mouth
5
She made him a porpoise gills a-snort
because it was so hard to configure that body
The words weren’t there or they rolled over
and supplied mermaids and mariners For him
the language is a woman’s body and she
will stand out in the rain a hundred years
running it back at him Hast ’ou seen the rose
in the steeldust (or swansdown ever?) Have
you seen a falcon stoop? Hast thou found a nest
softer than cunnus? Can yee see it brusle
like a Swan? O so white! O so soft! O so sweet
is she The sonneteer coughs sneaks
another look at her dolphin scores out
the ellipse after his vibrant tail
6
within the temple gate and you knew
she was just delicious cooking up a storm
like this in the big kitchen of your heart
The bee in the fox-glove, the mouth on the nipple
Words! and be forgiven hot kisses translated
with cool accuracy She ripples past his lilly
in a Christal to get at a thyme-burning bee
shut up in a crystalline Perfect footwork
Bobble down that track loverboy they’re bringing
out the focaccia bread studded with olives
and a rough red to match your breathing
She’s a contrejour effect on the
