3 Poems from Key West

Portential
Hard-boiled islands
strung on a chain of highway

bisect the uncut peaks of topaz,
the circling barracudas.

The silken flesh of bulbus palms
shelter dark bricks. Gray and olive shadows.
Fronds mutter. Their flanges twiddle the cold
'tween drowsy blades.

Here, grandmother broke her hip
on a sidewalk planter grate on Duval.

Here, my confused heart marinated
in cruelty's salt sting, ever faithful.

Here, a stranger brushed against mein a garden lit by distant fire.
Born for death, I commit days
to a pilgrimage: a garden, on a rock, in the water:

my devil,
in a deep blue sea.
_ _ _ _
Cracked Open
I keep agreeing to go further,
figuring if I endure
I will arrive
eventually. But,
I never arrive.

My heart wants.
Involuntary wanting wants
and wanting wants
relentlessly. Still,
it wants more.

My descent is indecent.
I, enchanted, am decanted,
warm with shame, brine and heartbreak
immensely, like
a raw egg cooking in the street.

I have put my lips to the flesh of thinking,
licked his salty neck overtly,
the stream of consciousness conveys my soul,
covertly. But,
language sets these sordid pictures on the Internet.

You lay your head upon my chestand gobble up my exhalations.
I brace myself, my expectations
petrified. And
wait for the kiss, reciprocation.
_ _ _ _ _
Drastic Measures
There are those who can in fact
cut off a moderately dangerous mole
using a exponentially more dangerous axe.

The key: you must entrust at will
to stand very very very still. Very very very still
and to prepare yourself, said mole to kill.

Also key is not to know
the exact moment of the blow,
less you flinch and also go.
_ _ _ _