Lynn Xu

Lie me down to heal in sleep, do not let me wake In sin, the tongue Cancels another year, another painted storm In the coral caves, some pious poet Drunk on vapors Swatting tomb-bats in the nightwood, would that Wayward bark sunned white Be also thunder, a hill of bones drumming—thud Thud, a wake Of buzzards braiding into the loosening skull—the redoubled fists Of students like an island in the bramble chained—I have been told To reason, lawless, empty, without rights— But I am old Not age, I have been told To match its columns by our footfall, prophet—I am not The straw or garland of our Sirens, not the brow Of holly, nor the warble Of any lark

Doors open and shut. We ’ ve come to the place where nothing shines. I hear eternity Is self-forgetting.  Interiors warm with the nightmare of guests and poetry And you.  Everything darkly Reverent years of reading about death eluded. Bled Back from the ear sidestepping your bullets bloom in on ye lay Rock.  Rud.  Spread So swiftly tastes like mud.  Dredged mud off The corpse sled hushed down woodsmoke. Said the stars thrum on Marie Marie.  Hold on tight. In the depths of outer space Is man.