Going Public

An odd, static exposure in asphalt fog and weird
chaotic sunlight, the aftershock of violence –
our wrench from bed into the publicity of Radio Shack –
its shortwave parking and day-splintered windows,
our befuddled circuit for the high definite,
for the unscramble
in the cords and antenna aisle –
we channel nouns, send skin signals, fix on pelvic
clarity – shattering dipole strangeness,
thick band, lingering drag, tight at the gonads
and chest, semen pulse for startling reception.
Turn away and toward –
it’s in the blood –
this charged and fluent harmony, electric.

Molting

See. There goes another one.
In this early fall of feathers
I have found seven, one
for every day, blue steel sheen
calling from the pavement or gray spin,
filamented, rotating before my feet
like a maple key, a promise of return. He says
molting is going on in my tree and I think about energy
persevering, separate, unconscious,
physics and meaning wound into one, every gain
a little loss, differences between us
negligible, all time happening all the time,
the two of us and the bird we know exists
from feathery evidence alone,
growing up together.