Free Verse

1. GIDI BEAD

red seed bead

smallone

wax on firestick

unstuck and plunk

sunk in the river

to tumble and tumble

swashed by rocks

and catfish tails

a happy seed to be lost

on the bottom

not bobbing on top

a blood red ruby all pretty

for ruin and doom in the belly

or sandy renewal on some shore

2. GIRL

a squeaky-toothed and smiling girl

brown as a girl from the sun

drowns herself purring

stretching and flexing

aching with ochre-tinged warmth

in a blood red sandy circle

described by her own arms

stinging and ringing with freedom

beneath that itchy canopy

of blue blue blue infinity

3. KNOWING

a pointed and pecking thing

more bitter and more dark

than the baking black surface

across which half of it is spread

sizzling and bristling

caws its loathsome desperation

as metal hulks swerve by

all impervious to its sharpened lunges

'though the thing flaps and glares

and its eyes are everything

with agony rage and knowing

amidst feathers swirling like leaves

blackened on a scorching wind

4. OLMAN

i know

he says grinding his new teeth

with a sound like planks in a broken ship

i know boy

he says with his eyes

on fire with the moon

and other things i don't want to see

i know the names of all the things here

he says and tilts his head back

watching me from the bottom of his sight

white hair swirling a madman's halo

you tell me story now, boy

and you better not fuggin lie to me

he says with something at his palms and fingertips

that i refuse to see

and so i dig down deep for story

as i feel some

thing

there in my gut

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