In Prisms In Paradise
for Bryan Boddy

i.
about as close at present
as we've ever been

able to push in or out
or in and out

inside the verb, inside the word
able to move about

occasionally, upon a limb together
she and I, her and me

together perch, or together fall off
or upon our faces

how careful she is
about the steps she makes
about steps she takes

well kept in her hands
well protected in her hands

clueless though she can be in crisis
with decisions to be made

about which way to go
which way to turn

I turn away from her
have done it time and again

way away from me waiting
until the journey together
recommences

on foot or me on top of her
or her on top of me

heap of love
antithetical to a heap of shit
upon a green lawn

ii.
let our eyes not touch
must not allow it, not two boys

this unbearable business
meeting eyes

admitted between the opposite sex
made uncomfortable otherwise

same sex, eye-in-eye
when locked in hostility
or when about to be

iii.
why why why
women I'm inclined to go after, go for

their usual inclination
to pull away, attempt to flee

and I must go after them
must chase them like cheetah
hungry for deer meat

iv.
just want to know
you go from wall to wall
like water filling a pool up
like air in a room

just want to know
that you leave no gap
the rest
not to be concerned about

like getting the grammar
in the sentence exact, correct

like having served your sentence out
and you can be let out

out of prisms into new ones

full of light
and new life and fresh air

v.
want to look like a million bucks
even if worth but a nickel or a dime

hand in hand or arm in arm with a man
want the world to know or to imagine

your man had all the wealth in the world

diamonds and pearls, gold and silver mines
you two from a whirl of wealth

Rumpelstiltskin, from straw,
spun corn for a princess to savor

to save her from fate's knife
night's knife
for a taste of the good life

vi.
I sense a bull
am I sensible or silly
about art, about Spain

about black and white
about black in white

about what's right
about what's wrong
about who is, who isn't

sense a bull, sensible
or silly about art, about fashion

about Versace, about Italy
about Fellini

who, if anybody, silly about me
will find me irresistible, what I wrote

after I am here no more
dead and buried

I pee poems and I pee actually
the former more than the latter

something that I eat or drink or think
which keeps the poems flowing

it is that the language
needs refreshing always
why it flows through me

like purified water
I purify adjectives
verbs, words

vii.
he wants the world to know
the whirl he’s in

the dicks like axis, he whirls upon

spun from homosexual love affairs
never over, though he’s out of bed

he winds as he goes
anyway, any where he goes
winds wherever he is

viii.
squeeze a lot of people
into a space, into a room

taste after taste after taste
of alcohol
make the fit, make them fit
tighter, more and more snug

connect and tug, rub, rub-a-dub
sparks bound to fly

someone bound to die before it's all over
before the club closes

why we'd squeeze ourselves
into such spaces, such places, a mystery

are we lonely, these situations
are they remedies

my pen fills my fist, I box with it
until I'm sweaty

dance with it, without end


© Obediah Michael Smith, 2008
12:44 a.m. 27.07.08