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ancient invitations
 
come under this immense grey shelf of sky
in a thoroughly liquid morning 
of mute wars where nothing glares
behind the cloud-murmur
come under this squirming turmoil of clouds
that churns toward rival solar systems 
above the parking lots
gravity reaching toward gravity
the eternal strain balanced with perfection
see the universe milked for light by morning 
glint on the tar
and the Milky Way returning
sense the ancient dinosaur breath
on ancient bodies
divining the secret of your own
with distant hands 
between the pressed metal flowers of street-signs
the flaking reptile skin
silk odor of flesh rippling outward
between the stilled turmoil 
of ancient metals printed on with modern figures
 
with the stern gentleness of cactus
 
come under the streetlights 
electronic flowers suckling in the febrile air
come under the sheen of windshields
with a body of moist stone
find between the rushing rivers of white water 
seething without torment
a crimson path through the wood and the water
 
the glass trickle that is your spirit with everyone's spirit
momentary as the tides
and just as immense
between plastic-strewn river banks
and beaches strewn with torn love letters
that shimmer like fallen birds 
in the white electric light on white sand
like the white between newspaper letters
 
the riverbed that sweats beneath the current
with the tender noise of your own blood
churning brown mud toward the heavy oceans
a path of sunlight that cannot ripple
suddenly puckering into mirage
on the crackling cement
in feverish contact with the earth
and the pushing sound of stems
calmly ravaging the dry ground
hindering the vines
that long to crawl white brick walls
in a brutal path of sunlight
solar energy bouncing on the steaming brick
seconds after rain
 
with the stern gentleness 
of cactuses strongly growing
writhing without pain
 
the eternal moment
hanging from a statue's eyelash
above the eyes of rainwater
hands reaching into a shopping cart
silver in the molten heart
of the sun's mapped ghost
and coming up with glinting
lovingly murdered fish
calmed heartbeats
momentary
tingling ribcages
momentary
the day split into flesh
the innumerable sweet aches of the body 
that join the perfect ages of trees
measured in silence
 
measured in lightly crackling rings 
within the feverish trunks
and cycling outward toward the breathing bark
and your own breathing skin
simultaneously
guiltless senses
reaching through the chalked transparencies
stringing galaxies around that growth
of the ferns bent at the tarred edge
of man's spiritual infancy
and the lapping of green water on the mossy rocks
that sprout past the calendar
licking like a ghostly row of thirsty dogs 
at the senses detached behind a seething pine forest
uplifted past a veiled highway
strung in the years of the wood
coiling tensely
the perfect years 
growing outward like a galaxy
each tender line around the eyes
a wrinkled year
youths prematurely old
ancient in the faces that drift 
beneath the cold parking lot lamps
dripping with erratic numerals and figures
in the green and hollow neon
 
whirlwind spirits treading lightly 
on glimmering cement
sprout like cauliflower
the flawless ease of growth
that the body senses
in crackling ferns at the tar's edge
finds in the flesh the same miracle.

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