Ghost Factory

1 Magnolia —
The night is air,
the night is threadbare
over my head...
Your envelope came alone to the box downstairs...
Still unopened on the windowsill —
pages reorder and
words travel — growing,
unread and alive,
pearly,
rough, dreadfully imagined...
“michael:
dimitry
left me on november 18th.
i can finally
sweep a big breath into my lungs
, a little bit now, most of the time,
without crying.
[...]
i’ve missed you.”
Your letter, maybe, is unsigned.
Unseen, folded up in its
tooth-white envelope.

I cannot mail this back —
poetry is fallow these days,
mostly a series of hyperliterate, filthy jokes.
(“a semper paratus penis!”)
Your un-unsealed letter remains unanswered.
— Regards, Michael.

2

white blossom
unsticking her lips
below our window
heavy strung with
water beads on
her petals magnolia
blooms and bows
once softly
her scent
rises softly

3

Magnolia Avenue —
The night is air,
the stars are threadbare
over my head...
Branch’s buds
turn from yellow-gold to green.
Three days pass,
now leaves web twenty feet above the street.
Spring, shadowdance,
ants spiderweb the living room floor —
now Mom calls to chat, ask about school:
“It’s well” I tell her.
She quotes Frost, always an
English teacher (“Nature’s first green...”)
and I nod a nod she can’t see. I crack the blinds
with a forefinger — the sky’s come unknit!
A loose string
tugged.
I’m impotent.
No hyperliterate joke here.
Home is here where the heart sickens,
nevermind the temperate changing of seasons.
Here time passes.
Here, nothing changes.
The circle completes itself again.
I’ve been home one year and
twenty nine days, still ill in every cell...
Blossoms unfold shining,
white as paper.
Blossoms are open and I am unraveled.

* “a semper paratus penis!” is from “A Red Flower” by Frederick Seidel