Simon PERCHIK










Tighter than a branding iron :my flashlight
worn down --I will name him
and his cheek melt from the wound
--he will bleed, recognize the kiss
that clinks :an anchor torn open from
outside
delivered in the dark, letters tangled,
missing
and from his crib the cries
the way lost-at-sea
sailors listen for their name.

I will twist these batteries
so no one hears creaking in every oak
chosen from among the quietest leaves
as sails still bandage a breathless mast

--his name will heal :a scar
where a star still alive
over his cheek heavier than water
and in that dark
sent to the bottom
waiting to say his name

--two names :the second chance
--flames favor the dead, refire
but only once :my son
named after me, at night
with a burning-glass :this flashlight
as if some need-fire
without any ashes
names him and trembling.





*



Nothing enters painlessly, the Earth
chucks up our hubcaps, puddles, rust
as mothers long ago learned

--we are taught to kiss
with our mouth closed, to hear
their dark, bent
and the creak we cannot see
unrolls the Earth
the crushed lullabies, mufflers
and evenings

--I'm hauling this sun
back into the ground
into an ocean never heard before
--carting a light that wouldn't wait
whose first breath came from this dark
and the last, half asleep, again
carried down in my arms.




*



The cots, the stove, the crew
unclaimed in this Nissen hut :my mailbox
between twelve more :a camp
ditched, the road too narrow, curved
from rain and letters home, tissue thin
too weak to lift my lips, my slow
wide, rippling sweep
crumpled to tin, its great arc
now eyes and claws and thirst, the flag
soaked in blood, waving where it fell.

People I don't know send letters
promising to lose. I've already won!
A SOUTHERN CAPE FOR TWO that couldn't wait
printed on the envelope --my hangar's

full. Too many capitals and these stamps
each day heavier :monuments
defaced the first time up
tenacious as fly paper

--I can't separate the mail
just by calling out, every name
sounds as if mine at some briefing
we agreed the last one left
a prize that sounded more like laughter

--the letters too heavy now :a heap
as clouds still gather each evening red
--the last carrying their dead
to the pile :every sky

waiting on my table to be sent home
as a flower reaching into the world
or letters with my name outside.






*



No hardhat and this stubborn doctor
too close, my heart
battering his head --his timid fingers
knocking to unearth from my chest
the great cave, the fire that listens

for flesh --he collects and keeps a chart
slants is pencil-thin light
writes on my eyes
something I want forgotten

--without a rope, the light
lowered through my throat.
He says my breath is still in place
warm from human sacrifice.
He asks how old I am

and my heart by milliliters
is carried off on a tray
as if a wince could tell
what blood was like in ancient times

the blood that always saw me naked
the blood long before the Earth
began to beat :the avalanche
still gushing out my arms
my colors and perfumes.

This doctor's used to snapping nerves
with pointed hammers and whisk brooms
--he digs bareheaded, uncovers
the murmur stone by stone :so many deaths
for one brief grave :my heart
as sometimes an old school song
and the soft drizzle that was a name
before his cold fingers, the fierce cough
he tells me to try.






 


 





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