"'I'm cool with doom,'" "In Frequencies" and "Bearings"

“I’m cool with doom”

—Mark Sargent

 

I drool when i come, i command with rules, lures and lore
as the earth opens quick rancid jaws repulsed and cauterized
by ebullient light and oxygen, the threatening unpredictability
of more than three lungs, three wings, a colony of rolling dogs,
this cross-cultural omelet with lamb, eels & vegan cheese
when you have to break through the plasma to get to the shell,
liberating a swimming pool, turning a dam into a drive in, dive in,
who needs diversion when you're facing the omega, the omg of edges
where the only not falling is an inner stillness
deep as the marianas trench

Is the opposite of doom good fortune, gluttony, overpopulation,
a doomocracy none of us voted for, much adoom about nothing
when death takes a cruise and the shorelines sneak further away

Im not dr doom, mount doom, joe doomagio, doomald trump
but i'm too cool to even twitch when something sounds
like my name, that bass no one else is hearing or they'd be dancing as i am
inside the canyons of our long bones, my eyes are geodesic dooms,
omnidirectional oblivion, im in the mood for doom

Simply because im so close to something this large and powerful
i cant see hear or smell, the way cats walk soundlessly across a room
you know they're not moving—every-thing-body else is
i'm not cool with not being the center of momentum, being  part
of the silenced majority—most of what i pay is what i'm not allowed
to receive, dammed and diverted from me to irrigate what's already
so lush it takes dozens of silent or doomed to maintain
the counterflow, the drainage and suppression, blue tooth vampires
meters that keep spinning when no one's been home for years

 


 

In Frequencies

Ask a clock;  ask a disconnected cable
before the sun can speak i’m stirring biscuit
frozen flour   frozen toes
every car horn in half a mile won't stop

the wind wants my skin but why
my feet have never liked darkness
my car knows the garage isn't home

<><><>< 

Slaking a moment, spinning a sirloin
prices only go down when sizes decrease or supply balloons:
a portion, potion, the enzyme for speech
filtering an explanation from an hour of city

from script to scripture to prescription
i fast three days and shower often\
my stomach eats my dreams before i can see them
what more can i let go of

<><><>< 

This is the bus route of my dreams
the radio can play 20 stations at once
equalizers are oxymorons​
how many wave lengths can I compromise
              before anyone notices
an inch before collision

<><><>< 

there can only be one in every crowd
remembering a soup no one's made since Dickens
before so many, so consistent
a seven-way intersection
stars made of pizza slices

my robe descending in slow gravity
is smoke, flour, dead skin,
or a rare imperfection in time

 


 

Bearings

In the bone
in the wind
without dialogue
a drifting speed

Down by the railroad tracks
a mysterious street
hammers before breakfast
where water heats itself
skin aching to be clean

Vegan eggs
bacon script
a steaming empty cup
some languages can't say this

A door too narrow, steel windows
i can almost see behind me
the sidewalk and me moving in sync
disagreeing at most corners
evidence of who was just here

A rippling tree, shy asphalt
take a step, give a step
soil spasms as if something was dropped in it
a seed develops through the depth of years
a seed gradually works its way through the depth of years
to feel the sun and smell the rain

 

 

dan raphael

dan raphael's most recent books are In the Wordshed, from Last Word Press, and Maps Menus Emanations, from cyberwit. More recent poems appear in Impspired, Mad Swirl, Lothlorien, Otoliths and A Too Powerful Word. Most Wednesdays dan writes & records a currents event poem for The KBOO Evening News in Portland, Oregon.

 

Edited for Unlikely by Jonathan Penton, Editor-in-Chief
Last revised on Thursday, June 6, 2019 - 22:40