Of Covalent and Ionic Bonds

The four-wheel drive Geo Tracker bounds off the road.
Inside of the house, sleeping residents dream
of each other, back-floating in pools of gentler hues;
while outside, rooster tails of topsoil—O & A horizons—

corrupt the atmosphere like a flailing Kraken, besmirching
the geraniums & marigolds, charring the power-washed vinyl siding.
And as if in triumph over a legion of lawn ornaments—old ladies bending
over and away—my brother raises his fist and shouts,
“I am Brummett! Ha, Ha!”

***

Head bowed and not daring
to peek, his mother’s hands clasp
—gently, but as firm as our land & sky cling to each other at night—
as if the prayer contained within them

was a bird; once freed,
it might never return.

A Poem for This Winter

And I,

(yes and

another assumption of an other)

I like

soft powder on roads, pre-[salt and plow]

you casually slip into spinning your tires.

A pastime: going nowhere fast

thousands of revolutions per minute

imagine it:

how quickly we run out of bullets

and causes and tears–

tears like bodies and contracts.

And I like

the moon, full and at midnight,

seems as though it could be a purple shade of day:

a purple son for a purple father.

And the moon is 233,000 some miles away.

I could drive there in 140 days,

if the roads would start rising

and quit falling away towards horizons–

it’s always with these damned horizons,

we’re looking towards.

And I like

it’s so cold even time starts to freeze

and seconds drop like icicles from white gutters

(musical accompaniment: Kitaro).

Blood drops from a deer that’s shot.

It’s running away from death

and I could crawl in between some trees, a cluster of three–

pines–as I pine softly, resting bones, waiting to

watch my breath pixilate, prostrate.

And I like

everything is so silent,

but it’s not muted, just hushed, even the wind

and it’s like we’re all standing here waiting for a sign

the message from God, but we’re meant to be Gestalt

(yes, He’s German, not Nazi, but perhaps from the East).

It’s hard to stand far away (see big pictures, fill in blanks)

but I try, He knows I try.