Painted it in the deep
dark night.
Still, it's the moon
of zillions of stars!

Come May. Come what may.
The most significant thing today
first Monday in May
my wife six months pregnant with twins
says she’s scared what we’re getting ourselves into.
Like the time I moved into an apartment uptown
I mean way uptown, Bronx uptown, uptown
where I’d never been
bomba echoing in the airshaft
painted the walls banana yellow and moved out the next day.
Lost the deposit.
A few months later moved back to the same neighborhood,
stayed a decade.
I’m not—scared, that is—but they’re not kicking my insides out, either.

Blank walls, spackled
And clean, yet empty.
Stretch out your weary arms;
Feel the numbness in your fingers.
A can of paint, a brush, and a pan -
Colors bleeding from the shape of your mind.

Take a deep breath,
Feet flat on the ground,
And open your eyes.
You can remake yourself.
Paint the walls.


Blank walls, spackled.

tonight the sky.

dark palette.

the stars are projectors.
the paintings of them are in
perpetual motion,
carry the zero.

conflicted still life.
of spathodea.
of pomegranate.
of her own folded-up *****.

it's all in how you interpret
the brushwork.
girls can tell.

a reassuringly dull sunday
turns to intrigue.
the busy girl buys beauty.

people are places and things.
lost affections in a room
in need of images
or at least explanations.

she looks for it.
she listens for them.

the sound of existing.
the sound of a quiet room.
a rainstorm or possibly the sound
of someone taking a shower.

blind little rain.

autosleeper lowers her head.
the economy of sleep patterns.
and little else celsius.

tonight the sky.

tomorrow a place where
one can ruin oneself,
go mad, or commit a crime
with paint.

Don't be late
dip your toes fast.

It's up to you
if you want to do it
at the same time
when the day too
melts down into
one more pith dark
finishing line.

The twilight has a
lot to digest then
as one more day
cools off into it's bold
deep painting splash
make sure you go first.

Before the waxing moon
scurries to the sea
looking for it's mirror  
on the deep shady water
only to discover
zillions overlooking stars
are already there!

We were in a painting, the two of us
She was holding my hand
In the soft glow of our own bodies
And the warmth of her palm
I felt it in my throat, and on my face

We were in a painting, you and me
And the way you lay in my arms
I felt, a stranger in my own home
Who are you, who are you?
In one strange city of love, I found you

She stands in the distance,
The smell of a memory on her hands
Old blankets and old incense,
Old meals and tangerine melancholy and wick-fire soot,
The smell of sharp turpentine and paint
Reaching for me, like tentacles floating in the air.

She stands in the distance,
Sunbeams dripping from her fingers
She stands, with a question on her face
And I watch her, and I can only imagine
Time standing still, frozen; my soul immortalized in a single stroke of tantalizing yellow
I am made of paint and light.