Pygmalion
there are those, I discovered late, who were not born
loathing their bodies
whose faces grew from their souls, & were not stamped
upon a skull with little care
A Cheap Black Rosary
when I wasn’t looking for a teacher
she arrived
with her casual blasphemies
wearing the crucifix between her breasts –
cheap, plywood, & with her sweat
the black dye trickled
Submission
I am tired of submitting to your beauty
as I am tired of submitting to the endless
magazines online nothings & hand-stapled
dreams
& their editors
careless with their editing
Carry
such beauty;
it yearned to be a poem –
it wanted to travel with me,
& in me,
& witness for itself,
its own beauties
Rouen
cigarettes & two words –
le bel! Le bel!
shouted over the water, momentary
madness our bondage
freed in chains, exultation free in
passionate strings;
Morts Anglais
Lovers kissed, beneath us, passionate
their clothes no impediment to the universe – haute
once, now shuddering with greater dishevelment &
royalty; their lips were everything,
mud,
beauty,