August

Homage to Morton Feldman “Before the oracle, with the flowers” —1 Kings 7:49 1 Here in the gloaming, a wormwood haze — the “m” on its head, a “w,” amazed at what the drink itself does: Vermouth, god bless you — th. 2 What really matters now is begonia, he thought, distracted while reading — their amber anther and bone-white petals missing from a jade pot by the door — not a theory of metaphor. 3 In this corner, sweet alyssum. And beside it fragrant jessamine. Almost rhyming scents in the air — a syntax weaving their there, there. 4 Erodium holds an eye in the pink looping the white of its tendering cup. 5 The blue moon opens all too quickly and floats its head- y fragrance over the path before us: And so we slit its throat, like a florist. 6 These hearts-on-strings of the tenderest green things that rise from dirt, then fall toward the floor, hang in the air like — hearts- on-strings of the tenderest green things — they rise from dirt then fall toward the floor, hanging in the air like — these hearts-on-strings of the tenderest green things, rising from dirt then falling toward the floor, hanging in the air like 7 Moss-rose, purslane, portulaca petals feeling for the sun’s light or is it only warmth or both (they need to open) an amethyst almost see-through shift 8 Bou- gainvillea lifts the sinking spirit back up and nearly into a buoyancy — its papery pink bracts proving with their tease of a rustle and glow through the window — there is a breeze. 9 Epistle-like chicory blue beyond the bars of these beds suspended in air, (what doesn’t dangle?) elsewhere, gives way to plugged in, pez- purply thyme, against a golden (halo’s) thistle. 10 What’s a wandering Jew to you two, who often do wonder about that moving about? Its purple stalk torn-off and stuck elsewhere in the ground takes root and soon shoots forth a bluish star with powder on its pistil. Such is the power of that Jew, wherever it goes (unlike the rose), to make itself new.