Moreno

in the beginning void
like a hunch of black shoulders;
then
like the whisper of blood in cavernous places
your mountainous voice
before which I was
an unformed thing.


your feathery body in my ear
saturday mornings
as you rest from
gorgeous labours, a white throat
upon my bulkish breasts
and the fast blood within
oh
slow,
the yellow crest
of winter.


but
sleeping on the bank
in the cadillac and sweat
in my clefts and yours,
drops like wolves’ eyes
in the silvered wood,
the river white with joy,

I look
and see in your artful slouch
the love I am to have
of you,


my arms cupping my woman’s body
my nails in my thighs
on the orange carpet
a black tuft of your hair
a dark boatman
sailing a tributary of blood.

ASPIRATION

I put down my head
to ignore you,

lingering always
like a beetle
moon
scaling
(heard but not seen always
like the hovering snitch of rat’s foots;

the foamy blood
dribbing at my black lips;
juices drying
in my cylindrical eye,

my love for you like
a dog with
its dying
head stuck in a pipe,
rasping starvation).

I put down my head.