j.a. van wagner :: wordobject :: imagetime

These are the rogue waves that scour the ocean;
self-surfing, uprising.
I had something else in mind
that was too mild. Instead,
all is terror: torn wings,
declarations, wild birds and amphoras—
copulatives instead of conjunctions.

Sly, wounded beasts crawl from my mouth;
from my penis, crocodiles. Snails send sensors
from beneath my fingernails. Yet I have eyes 
that at last are living, though in a place
far from the sainted maps.

To the town arrive new villagers. I offer ways
that come to me unbidden.
Who’s to say they are not thankful? But why
doesn’t my reckless mouth stand still
instead of dancing
agile as sunlight over a pail of water?

If only my arms did not lay dead as wood.
If the poles of my fingers were not simple shrubs.

The lift of the green wind: I rise from rooftops,
strike air white with my keel,
turn and turn in a helical storm.
My spiral arms reach out,
out, until lost becomes us. Lost,

we are lost, but sky turns sweet
paper, origami hand pinching a crane’s tail.

Fresh hollows in the air replace us.
Water flows from
frail-tipped saucers.