syrup waffles

In the neighbourhood where we live we don't speak the language
some days we are what we need     other days dumb
not enough. The key scrapes. Pins and needle picks
Billy your flowers bloom then slime over
Hudson harrassed by eskimos     They stole his nails
fed him     froze off his toes     son and carpenter stranded
on the empty inner ocean
               wind stirring    raising smells
morning garbage    coffee grounds    some Chinese oranges
a wall of birdsong     obstinate insomniac maniacal but calm
me and the vegetables    on the grass in your garden
Presbyterian pigeons singing new blues     Levites on the Danube
the unintelligible argument     brume drowned in vaporetto traffic
spindrift feelings spewing a long way off     cucumber-cut by a European hatchet
sue them, their sons, their sons' sons and the daughters
who are greedy and pretty and used to that kind of thing
teach them how to draw the right volumes and proportions
under the decorous thunder of his organ she lost everything
falling into a melliferous armpit     intestate alone the ship's boat sinking