(...)
(...)
called to testify but will not speak,
preferring silence to stupidity
(...)
in contempt of well-wishing
banality and its bottomless stomach
(...)
a numbing path between
frozen foods and docu-dramas,
talk shows and celebrity divorce
(...)
only to kneel before the rack of fame
again and again, until bleeding knees
leave crusted pools in twos
upon the linoleum bedrock
(...)
O, Magma
(...)
pert rubber boobs
lure lonesome dicks
to paid humiliation,
the violation of Barbi
(...)
an approximation of intimacy
breeding distance
(...)
the soft scraping sound of skin
dragged across asphalt,
smooth flesh ripping to tatters
exposing bare bone
(...)
then scattered the remains
strategically within the house
and the surrounding garden
(...)
seeds that germinate
with or without nourishment,
thriving by tenacity alone
(...)
borne to a surface of video feeds,
birdsong, snoring, the distant toot
and clatter of a passing train
(...)
a nostalgic longing sinking down,
impressions gathered young
(...)
a summer night's trembling insect choir
frantic rising clouds encircle
porchlight, streetlight
(...)
only a windowscreen stands between
the bed and the lawn
(...)
no idea how to read a glance
with testicles still hairless
(...)
too far removed to realize
that intimacy given can also be
cancelled and forgotten
(...)
swarms of gnats, barbed-wire fences,
rutted gravel roads, pollen,
thistle and burr
(...)
all such things left behind
(...)
incite a panic state of sorts,
an anxiety pointing toward emotions
contained and unresolved
(...)
a call to forgiveness does not mean much
if there is no one to forgive
(...)
all that was abandoned
refuses to remain there,
will not lie still, but persists
in an undifferentiated signalling
(...)
a humid ravine, a starved rock
(...)
accompanied him and permiated
the region preceding speech
(...)
as sight becomes transparent,
and this tree is seen as all trees,
this lawn all lawns
(...)
just there it is
and they are
(...)
the counting of days
adds up to very little
beyond this broken body
(...)
inclined to humor
a metaphysical optic irksome
to that part of him preferring
simple fact
(...)
tedium of hours spent
behind a counter counting
change not by the book
but by cycles of the moon
(...)
the flat monotony of the terrain obscuring
other vistas of splendid breadth
and beauty carried behind the sternums
in those least assertive
(...)
introspection only jeopardizes
earning potential
(...)
the dog nearly choked itself
with its collar
all tight like that
(...)
disquiet is a kind of noise
annoying for its hollow ring
(...)
and emerged from the hiding place
to find a city laid to ruin
(...)
region and its tribes persist in a descent
into chaos, anarchy, and bloodshed
(...)
prophets might stand to gain
(...)
swollen mobs slash and hack
(...)
species falter
(...)
clan and deity feed
(...)
is it realistic to be optimistic?
(...)
why is the yawning pit such an attraction?
(...)
the persistence of forgetting
insures that History will repeat itself
(...)
yet, improvements have been made in everything
from doorknobs to mousetraps
(...)
taste has been returned to the tomato
(...)
a gob of bile the size of a fist
landed splat on the sidewalk
just missing the cat
(...)
young Jeffrey kept the severed head
in a hat box
(...)
could any form of politics have avoided this?
(...)
of sun upon the water's calm
surface sheen and rippling
(...)
a malleable lattice of refracted rays
(...)
hazy light then too bright
(...)
a morning brimming
(...)
pre-dawn rain stirs
scent of fresh green and stone
(...)
as if to draw a measured breath
(...)
shattered bone slowly knits
(...)
tendons pull taut and strain
(...)
the body is bouyed by liquid
light and its every color
(...)
pain can only cease
(...)
cannot explain the varied song
or swaying fronds
(...)
propelled by an obscure inertia
(...)
silent wires transmit substance
(...)
string the beads
(...)
a voice overheard
penetrates the connective tissue
and lodges there like a pebble in aspic
(...)
obstacles in my way,tango version
(...)
listen, spray-paint it white
like a centerpiece bouquet
(...)
brushed softly by a passing wasp
(...)
and haunted by his own invented images
(...)
intersecting circles and loops,
shifting exterior boundaries
and interior content
(...)
stung by these redundant marks
appearing on the cranial page
(...)
inhabiting non-linear, pictorial
connective tissue
(...)
coveted thought mechanism developed in secret
and at great shareholder expense
(...)
investments in research
doubled in the last quarter
(...)
cartel assassins
within the organization
(...)
proven solutions insist
(...)
let the silken gown fall from bronzed shoulders
(...)
blade entered the lower spinal column,
severing the trunk nerve
(...)
if those aren't your shoes under the curtain, whose are they?
(...)
tied up and thrown in the back of the wagon
(...)
carbon monoxide mingles
with a whiff of cheap aftershave
(...)
goose-pimples rise under a satin wrap
(...)
tell-tale flesh response to touch and chill
(...)
spasmodic contraction of the vaginal tract
(...)
ticking twitch in the thin skin
(...)
and arrived, unannounced, at the ancient gate
(...)
I didn't hear a thing,
I swear as I'm standing here
(...)
admitted to the fragrant chamber
deep within the central mound
(...)
aromatic oil, ablution, ululation, return
(...)
virgin, bison, lingum, fire
(...)
one or not one
(...)
gesture, song, chant, prayer
(...)
repitition, pattern, abjuration, debt
(...)
forgiveness or damnation
(...)
is there and is not
(...)
above the prostrate self and gazing down
(...)
biting cold in the high atmospheric
(...)
unimagineable pressure, molten at the core
(...)
father's greeting arrives
muffled through mother's fluids
(...)
will recognize the tune,
the tone and timber
(...)
will struggle toward illumination
soft and diffuse
(...)
with the capacity to depart and arrive
simultaneously
twice
(...)
the mockingbird's apprentice will now perform
(...)
selected melodies proclaiming
a mimic's grasp of each intonation
accompanying day
(...)

© 1999 Timothy Trompeter