HEART THREAD Parts Seventy-Nine and Eighty

79.
Talk turns into a masked ball with
everybody
all I know is no one must know
otherwise the words don’t work, tell
only the true
never the new the one you never
the moon shining under the skin of
the sea
the long hair of the law the only
power
windswept and sound pressures the
heat that fell
from the absent sun so long ago
the weather is a spaceship bearing
messages
we have to catch new senses to
perceive their text
don’t be afraid to say hello we’ll
all be gone
three seeds plucked up by a pilgrim
bird. 
80.
Three are the gates of paradise
a blazing letter stands before each door
of course it’s in the dream it
happens
it matters only when you’re not awake
the vast blue bird perches on the
roof
wet towels of the swimmers drying on
the rail
in sun and wind the changes come
difference is a molecule apart
there is no nurture in the metal
world
bonfire on the beach atomies of
amorous madrigals
but if I were a folk I would tell you
clear
in wordsongs true as stones along the
beach.  

HEART THREAD Parts Seventy-Seven and Seventy-Eight

77.
Peaceable vortex a thun is a
time set apart
to be itself alone and nothing doing
in it but itself
a session on the other side of the
self to call it
door shut mind open listen to
listening
kept wanting more of it the
cheekbones
the tail feathers of equal length the
pinions
rimmed with blue though they look
black
magpies on the road in Colorado home
on the ground
dig deep to find the surfaces of
things
I am left with a zodiac on my hands
can I interest you in being me a
while
while I sail your white ship into the
typhoon?
78.
Woodpeckers four fledglings from a
locust tree
one more priest one more shepherd
sheepless a crowd of unbelievers
a perfect place an island think of
Latin
it never hurts to ask how red your
poll
sweet predators Mavors’ insectivore
do you hear his chimes beneath the
sea
no that is the wind that is Schubert
all alone
no one paid attention to the clumsy
instrument
the beak a young man has to know the
world
I slept my way out of more towns than
this
town or dream what difference she
lifts her skirt.

HEART THREAD Parts Seventy-Five and Seventy-Six

75.
O the street the street is a hand
that goes everywhere
why is there thistledown on your feet
I looked up mirror in the book it
showed my face
but only as others see it liars and
poets and thieves
maybe I also once stood beneath the
cross
ponderous useless unable to help him
pointless witness of so much
catastrophe
unless the act of witness has some
meaning too
everything that happens waits to be
observed
we are just iron filings summoned to
its shape
soon enough dispersed and baffled
ever after
but we know I saw this happen but I don’t
know what this is.
76.
Analysis is his vulture
browsing on human thought
write it down change it later pretend
you know
pretend it’s living steal rose petals
from the shore
you’re only borrowing the colors
light lent them first
I spoke mentally you understood
physically
what are all those prairies for
the linked absences that define sensibility
fervent mistakes “ambushes of young
years”
but I knew no worse so did what I
could
the shattered teapot the car too fast
so many pregnancies in the lost
museum.

HEART THREAD Parts Seventy-Three and Seventy-Four

73.
Stay out of sunshine walk in the
shade
I suppose this place an ancient apple
tree
older than Eden and ferns grow round
it
it leaves me with no answers
I feel glum and businesslike today
accountant of a bankrupt hardware
store
with nothing left but the names of
instruments
columns of numbers those birds of the
heavens
endlessly fluttering past and
vanishing
and O the hawk of zero knows my name
inscribable outstretched beneath him
divide by zero and smile for the
police.
74.
Some day I’ll get this someday wrong
and it will be today, the actual
two schoolchildren performing for
assembly
tell of seaweed stars in our flag
what about the starship from the
alien planet
why would they bother to come here
why do women wear flowers in their
hair
I never wanted to alter your routine
snow or swelter you know better
there are whole cities where the men
know less
spell your name the Irish way
then no one can whisper it in local
dark.