As/Is







8.28.2004


Late August

wedelia clipped fills blue barrels
the yellow flowers
have been scooped up
and the ground's becoming visible again

from our window
perspiration of the friends
removing the wedelia
glistens on their arms

it is morning
I am writing a report
of muddy water
I am charged with turning
into wine

I slept well
my green gunpowder tea
has stopped just shortof bitterness
I am wearing pale green
beneath an overshirtof preppy white
and gray smooth comfortable shorts

I am writing a history
of people who belong
to a specific organization
not getting along
the weeds we once thought
equaled flowers have grown
beyond control
the ground uncovered
improves upon
the covered ground

I consider every personality
justification embedded
in the several layers
of the skin
yielding meaning in each clip of talk

one person's resentment
another person's fear
the hunger for attention
equaling de facto fuel

the interchange
the interfacelong vines of connection
at the threshold of removal
hypothetically the sting
of absence
or the pain
of constancy
continuing

the patterns that include
no flowers
spawn flowers of imagination
bodies broken in their work
the illness in or near the work