Brad FLIS
Screams and Permutations
a German parasol expanding in the fields
me and Oscar Peterson pike-hooking in the fields
fly-fishing the wheat fields, enduring where the line ends
bending the burnt acres of winter wheat where the Rhine ends
where December gravities unload thy whelping stars with chains
bewailing in the dew cabins: Commande, Commande! the gentle chains
a signature of wind-blown plastic scraps, baroque
confusions, underlining the star-lit crates, escaping into skunk huts, broken
street maps, all resting in the skulker's hand
no horseback patrol units to blitzkrieg the outlaw rains, the panting hands
so much depends . . . we service the galaxies, experience the fields
as they construct themselves into rich piano keys, clusters of another 'fields'
North and South: Available Fastenings
Fetch me the mandible projections and I will govern
you with straw, a Southern drawl.
Prolong me with a cavalry of hail,
richly compiled, and I will speak to all the dyads,
yearning for contemporary breezes, as the colt
recurves into its motion, the tree
stays tree, and every spoon relaxes. Regard
the oriole arrivals, dumb trains, depth-charging
the tools of another culture, another Spring.
How like us they melt
into the cylinders, straining pumpkin seeds through yards
of unbaked clay, as though electrojets enlarged
the hominid duet, where I can see you warbling across
the hydro-field. Come, then, deny me
the port regalia, covet me with grass.
North and South: The Corridor Ethics
The porch-swings are left inquiring,
do you revisit them, their whereabouts of sheet music, soft acres of tin?
No one's hemming them, save the ocular braziers.
The Norse are counting them, but seldom understand
the gist embargo. You pop a wheelie in the dark,
expecting crowds to gather, to embark
in a field of Spanish cleaning solvents, but clue in
too late. Verily, you cite them. Jim
Crow lunges at the Poles, skips the subway gauntleteer
with epigrammatical stems, poinsettias in every
New York City. Why do the road motels glance
at them at all, knowing that the coyote-streams won't
fit inside one suitcase? You pack up the makeshift
ferriswheel yourself, headed for the next town, unable to breathe,
yet holding them close to your sonorous pockets.