I may have HIV

At the Grand Isle
in a search through driftwood
piles for a message
in a bottle

a syringe glanced
my shin

likewise, clearing thicket
at a housing site

we found tunnels,
an underground
city,

lanes where speed
thrived,

but where are the people
who left the needle
again stuck
in me?

Why did a metropolis
sustained by veins
of passion
dry--

have all of them
ascended?

In the seminars
we learn that conversation
is idle.

Habit

Habit gives rise
to a funny callus
that coats every
nerve end

content: all
is a brush
until an itch,
deeper, some

splinter

makes me file,
rejoice in cherry raw
skin, bruised
skin at every

touch skin,
plush.

In a toy pen

a child plays

with bare

resonance

wooden blocks

kindle,

but the burn

is in the attic

he reminisces

of these days

    days

lost,

but though dust

has dimmed,

that same pen

he is still

there, has never

left.

Consumed kimchi, coming down

Chili juice

    amasses in the well,

I dip the bowl

    to one side,

and it moves,

    a phantom blood-

hued koi

    that as I focus

pulls me

    into its amber

pool. I set aside

    the dish, 

as I have had my fill
    for the day.

The girl who smiles back

Back at the trail
I walked last week,
but  now a jet-
haired woman

walks too, and the chaparral
floods into sea,
turtles with moss-
covered backs

swim, I strip,
ask her to enter,
and we dip

*

I sit up, tend
to flea bites
and scratch
my terrier's
ear.

I never met
this woman

exactly, though
her hair I've liked
in one, her eyes

another. A dream
composite girl

my elusive piece
meal--I will always
see you only there.

table talk, shootings
in vogue
now, tomorrow
wristwatches

she pauses mid
sip and shakes
her head as they speak
about the gunman,

asks for creamer
because the coffee
is too black

yes it is terrible
how people do such things
delicious scone,
I am goo-
despondent

The night when
            you said I was a dog
    too happy to
         please, prods

like a gear
            in fast orbit
    and each spin
        lacerates

the room bled
            bend, that type
    who nods; veinous
        wrist

hot to stick
            into any gap
    but, time
        dulls

and the blunt
            nib on
    occasion
        may

prod like a niece
            who thinks for the seventh
    time she asks Guess what?
        you won't know

That's what awaits,
            before rust
    eats the gear
        and pain fades.

I thought Pigs on the Wing

      would be a nice song to wake

to, so each morning at Reed

      when I would look to see bare

branches, hoar-

      frost grass, I would detest

those words: you know that I care,

      that hovered above my poly-
ester blanket.

Selassie is the Chapel seemed fitting

      after I dropped out, but now

Marley's voice reawakens the itch

      lathed over my body

by fleas bred

      in the carpets and sheets.

Presently a shrill

      monophonic ring

disrupts my rest,

      and I walk to cook eggs

in my flat's kitchen.

I don't think I will change

      this tone; it may

be the best sound of all.