Expanding universe

Out of so much experience 
so little to signify it
in a language 
extraterrestrial life could understand
about our relationship with gravity 
and what's crudely human about being a human
we don't even have in common with ourselves. 
Out of so much sorrow 
so many tears shed 
like oceans of wounded salt 
like bruised orchids of blood 
like the light years between windows 
living next door to each other 
there is so much vastness between us 
in an expanding universe 
in the way we reach out to each other 
like the stars in wavelengths of farewell
toward the red end of the spectrum. 
Out of so much radiance 
so much shining 
not even the ash of anything 
to show for it 
when the last ghost has left town
with leaving so much 
as a love letter of smoke 
propped up against the mirror.
Out of so much that was seen once only for good 
and for a moment understood 
until we started thinking about it 
my eyes taste of what they've seen 
like iron apples ripening in the rain 
no one can take a bite out of 
to improve their education
by learning how to bury the dead 
because most of what I've seen 
is pain without insight 
pain without eyes 
like impact craters in the skull of the moon.
A war of windows in a world without vision
without stars 
without dawn and moonrise.
Viral eyes that abhor stained-glass 
as much as they do the godless clarity
of the most advanced telescopes
playing Egyptian roulette with the stars
to prove the Big Bang was cosmic suicide
and we're here like living proof of the afterlife 
of its bad karma
like a hunting religion in an agrarian society. 
Out of so much mystic specificity 
so little sense of earthly union 
in the fractious sameness 
that tries to blame everyone else 
for why things are falling apart 
as fast as they're coming together. 
Five petals open. 
And no flower blooms.
The sun rides a victory chariot through desert.
The moon a death cart through a slum. 
But the stars know
how much the night keeps to itself.
How much it can't say
when the silence clears the sky of birds. 
How much there is to express 
that leaves even the dead speechless. 
Out of so much verbiage 
so many words
so many opinions
stuck like bats in burrs 
just beyond the porch light.
Out of so much hatred of life 
out of so much hatred 
of light and water 
air earth and fire
compressed like a fist of coal 
around the blood diamonds of the ideologues
who write political suicide notes 
for whole nations by proxy 
who don't know how to bleed for themselves
or convince the dead 
they died for someone else. 
Out of so many words 
so many civilizations 
from the Tower of Babel 
to the New York Metropolitan 
with your narrow thinking that I am ignorant Egyptian
with its polyglot fire alarms 
warning Alexander 
about the approach of Caesar
and his love to have you as his own queen
Out of so many voices 
that spoke like trees in the wind 
or out of burning bushes
and the light of the stars
or the thunder that follows the revelation
that it's raining on a lifeless Mars.
Out of so much clamour and noise of insight. 
Out of so many whispers of stars 
and rumours of waves 
held up to both our shell-shocked ears 
that found us washed up on a beach somewhere 
after some serious weather.
Out of so many poems and paintings and heartfelt polygraphs.
Out of so much confessing. 
Out of so many speeches.
So many prayers and blessings
So many dead languages that carried their mother-tongue 
like mitochondria in the DNA of their mouths
down through the generations 
so that every living word 
contains the corpse of a metaphor
like a mummy under a pyramid 
or Nbms king catching his breath
to be interviewed
about a life after death 
that looked exactly like his
when he woke up to this all over again
with nothing much to say about anything. 
Out of so many with so much to say 
how few are listening 
as if their lies depended on it.


"In the recovery room, 6 hour's before making my third lung surgery"
I said "true story" but you used to hear the lies,