Amulet

"Split the stick: there is Jesus." – Gnostic proverb We are hedged about, we few, we hapless few, by the bones of living men. Their shattered hands stop the bullets. Their blood is our medicament. We are camouflaged in their skin; hid and guarded behind a wall of living muscle. Break the bone; there is Jesus. Tear the flesh; there is Jesus. Split the skull; there is Jesus. January 1996

 

To a Total Stranger, with My Apologies

Not all the pages I have read, deep as they are, much as they teach, am I so indebted to as the grain of sand that crept into my shoe from off the beach. No poem I have ever seen, though it tumble my thoughts past accounting, demands as much as that half-dead weed, limp to the touch, from off the mountain. No sermon I have ever heard, of whatever breadth, however high it raises the tone of the season, however spangled with color or reason, is as real as your eye.   January 1996

 

Verses Found on a Man’s Chest

I promise not to swallow you whole but to chew you up faithfully cell by cell savoring each nerve I promise not to tie you up in sonnets but to praise you in broken speech to raise cries from your heart to howl and shout with you I promise not to peck at your lips but to taste each separate tooth and taste bud I promise not to leave you high and dry but to give and take convulsive tribute. March 1996

 

Haiku for Goths

I embrace the whole razor-spangled world; why shouldn't I bleed?   April 1996

 

On the Failure of Verse

Love drips jewels from the mouth; its speech and kisses are that rich and ripe. The platitudes of strangers, dry as drought, shatter and will not serve – So, having nothing to command, I speak in turn -- nothing but ravelled rhyme and shambling meter and loose-lipped alliteration. When love burns the chill of broken houses is sweeter. When love burns I think I feel no cold. Hatred gags on it. Shame grows bold. Ennui lies fainting, bleeding, on the stairs, and death grows cheery. The very flies drop dead in pairs. The human race escapes; the gods forget their plans; the print in all my books resolves itself into the face of one good man . January 1996

 

What Happened?

She put on a cheap soft top that skimmed her apple-core waist (trust me: you would have eaten it yourself) and her round rich breasts with nipples that called for the pads of thumbs This cheap soft top (one shade lighter than her cinnamon skin polished to a summer glow) matched a printed skirt slit for legs like a National Endowment for the Arts She took all this and her cheetah face into the gas station where the door closed behind her in a vapor of musk just as if I had never happened. June 1996

 

 

 

Crosstown Bus

Well, after she was done telling me about how she nearly lost her leg to an embolism but, praise god, the doctor agreed not to use blood and she's here today offering me gaudy magazines with stiff prose and flimsy pages -- Yes, the Creator spared her to distract me from you -- I said "No thanks" without explaining why, but she wasn't done yet: She kept on trying to raise my eyes to her tinfoil God and his white bread paradise -- I think -- As I tried to remember -- Tell me again why we broke up? January 1997

 

 

 

Memorial of Christ's Death

The flesh of gods would not be so bland as frail communion wafer melting in the mouth or dry broken matzoth untasted on a plate. No, it would be rich with earthy smells and flavors: redolent of rye and wood smoke; sharp, maybe, with pepper or ginger; ecstatic with the warm ravishment of corn. The blood of gods would kiss the tongue with its sharp red liquor, with its natural incense rising from the glass, recalling the last decade's grain or last year's grape; or the labors of the yeast, or articulate bees, caught in sugar's alchemy. The flesh and blood of god open the human eye in glad surprise to their origin in the world and sink their tongue into your open mouth February 1997

 

 

Two Gals Talking

She hugged the ground with her long shining belly And raised her fangy face And explained:    "To live forever    where nothing changes    and nothing bewilders    and nothing amazes    would be no fun    and no use." "I don't want to die," the maiden said. "How do you know?" the snake replied. "Have you ever done it?" "I've seen it done," the maiden said; "It's not for me." "When you die," the snake explained,    "you turn Invisible,    like Him, Who Knows Everything    And discovers all with Invisible eyes." "I'd like to see everything," the maiden said. So she took it and tasted it. It was bitter,    but she liked it,    so she ate it --    and took one home to her boyfriend,    and he ate it, And the scary adventures began. February 1997

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© Michaele Maurer