— after Frank Ocean, “Nikes”

You would have laughed 
at the sight of us: bodies twisted,
one foot in the air to show off
a new pair of Nikes; iPhones ringing 
with warning about deep

I am afraid of a heart
above a head, inversion
willing erasure, the body
surrendering to gravity, violence
a chance some call skill
but only because a girl is great
when she risks

Lagos gods

"the gods are exemplars of human striving" —Wole Soyinka
 

Festival aura fills the atmosphere
i rejoice for you                     moyo fun e
i rejoice for myself            

Darling, stop being stupid, 
she says with all the tenderness she can muster,
which is not a lot, when I bring up my ex. 
At the dining table, in the gaudy rust of sunset,
she alternates between

We were allowed to be alone in the stadium, an object which is infinite. Prove it.
I can’t remember if we took the bus. More likely your dad dropped us in traffic and the civic door thunked on our

I want to give Glenn Burke a high five / I want to give Glenn Burke a high five for seeing Dusty Baker’s raised hand and just hitting it / I want to give Glenn Burke a high five for coming out in 1978

My legs on yours, in the stadium lights,
I have only just learned your name.
You point, across the outfield,
at the worst fight we will ever have.

I can barely make it out in the crowd
of

She was cursing at her TV. A Red Sox game was on. She was yelling at David Price, newly acquired from the Detroit Tigers. Price was behind in the count. I wanted to tell her that David Price was a

From the couch corner where 
his ass has crafted a killer dent
for the better part of a week,
my father begins shouting insane cuss words
at no one in particular – 
titty fucker bang bang, cunty

TOOLS OF IGNORANCE

“[the term] tools of ignorance...was meant to be ironic, contrasting the intelligence needed by a catcher to handle the duties of the position with the foolishness needed to play

The Festival of Convictions

5781     not moved to ceremony but moved
by the ground rejecting this nonsense   windows etc.
this very hill’s lack of integrity and possibly imminent dying

An absorbed sound

There was the night where the snow was quieter than usual
& your car wouldn’t start, so we stood under concrete

steeples to wait for the tow truck until your last hand

Times the Dog Looks for God

Sun is too hot
Sun is too cold
Fire alarm

Balsamic Moon

Lightning in remembered spaces
going dormant
Shade avoidance and dashboard doubles

Feeling

la tienda, or, the earth, fertile with nettles and

vegetables, bringing forth these meager

cypresses, this black damp that stains the

walls 

1.

words fall off the curl of nothing

I

don’t answer that

another quar poem

in the sixth month
i want to play skee ball
and put it in my mouth after.
i don’t know if my mouth
is big enough. it’s been so long.
which is bigger, the

All blue awnings

man stands for myriad of anonymous nouns
something like far off voice
presumably an empty mountain becoming his own
invention, able to stand by itself (i.e. come where I am)
is

hints on health

you touched my skin
in the crowded afternoon
my blood like a bloom
warm and erected

our bodies are useless
in winter
my need for excess
diminishes to the pursuit
of damp

sadness dies badly like a waiting room plant

every body is mostly water
and will still only sink or float

it’s so maddening
it takes me two hours to finish
an apple

sometimes the human in

crazy horse

half full heavy
whipping cream in their drywall construct
see me mob hammer ?
smack dab middle of july
i ask and clam up

that thunder is new to me
racking up the bill
instead

Britney’s People

Britney is a crystal swan born from a cave where they manufacture crystal swans. Britney’s People are her protectors. No people are as important as Britney’s People because it is

Fragrance

I never lost what I had out of eye    the piano minded surplus or acheless weather    what ever the
          night still oily with a personality is          there is no sense         

CRYSTAL THINKING

Dream logic gets my sober companion drunk
Vomiting silver in the private beehive of our wagon
I went to the cemetery and played you a too-fast solo
Mud seeped in the ass of my

"Utterance of a Folding Fan" and "Op. 64 in C#"

"Peak Inertia" and "You don't know if you should laugh at my poems"

On my first job I worked for a woman named Jeanie who owned a soda fountain, thrift store, and tavern. I worked at the soda fountain fixing milk shakes and simple sandwiches for the few customers that