“little doses”
from the perspective of dangling, knees hooked through trees. bark. and earth was the ceiling and we could stand on the sun if we were small enough. a far enough maybe. or maybe we can blame. there was a loud noise before and there was dust hanging then and there was waiting for the next wall of air. we were slow to madness. we were the blood collecting in ears and maybe we were gravity steeping into a forgotten cup of tea. the wall has disappeared with the one in the seat next to us. formerly. this is why the sun appeals.
“think how narrow the gap between”
all the grey trees lay down in unison. unisomnolence. if we all slept in rows would this blonde child still watch? but it is evening now. a fish ring intersects with the echoes of pebbles tossed. thus the fish is stone and thus. the child does not believe in cost when offered a bank of rocks. the child does not believe in fish, or talk. the stories I weave in a forest have no meaning; in that maze only lightning touches the ground. there are only dragons breathing. my own precious princess couldn’t hide any- where on these mountains we seek.
“the same grey covering”
no matter the imagined tragedy. upon waking light appears. too normal for the end. of the world. it was always so. adamant. today, the day after that. snow. the gleam of blue curiosity peels curtains back.
“passed out of recognition”
I don’t even remember sleeping. anymore. it’s been too long remembering strange narratives grown from hatchets and ash trees. it’s been too long with notebooks in the dark. all I have are nouns, wood chips, and the occasional uninvited. neighbor. most of them alone. most of them heading that way in time, however friendly. however lively. and what does a smile mean, anyway, even with a hello. a bloody thumb. a question of bandages. a stump. someday rain will peel away the earth from all of these fields. the trampled grass will part. someday the emptiness will end and jagged white will peer out. who will wait to sort a singular shard from so many. any. more. and if not found will the black soil stick forever. and will meaning be lost when cleaned from its dream. and will this mass grave be big enough for words.
“fairly complex specimens of metal work”
it seems the sun will never appear so burnt again. and before that. fresh. before the leaves were wet, it seemed the rain would never end. I claim that smell. small and green. I claim we are victims of reciprocal longing. or we are fully content. can you disagree while watching? grass grows higher and we hone worn blades. we could debate the proper curve, the merits of less carbon in the meat of steel, but instead. I claim that dialogue is poor fodder for dreams, that this is soft narrative. it is sparser than saplings to claim. a palm full of hulls. so I claim seeds spread from broken heads, harrows are wedges, and one night is just too short to mow a field with knives.
“far as I could see, all the world”
citizens, roads, elevation, water. how much was released from the many eyes of clouds? in a clean sky we visualize the contamination of stars. like tracking animals—watch a river in India, watch a python swerve. digital. not, not, not. there and there, and etc. and now here falls the archaeological latitude. nice even lines intersect in a ladder to climb. up there hangs our historical gauge, our java sky winks at us from between visible masses of vapor.
“sustained”
theory. journal. bridge. well. starched. hum. target. tone. crinoline. infernal. funeral. leers. crystal. grackles. pawn. tentative. embers. siren. rooks. marketing. fleece. hair. its. striate. patina. pachinko. anthracite. hidden. banjo. parlor. bangle. futile. decision. opening. exorbitant. stipulated. tremble. anadromous. alternative. sun. furl. lilac. stair. case. stumble. parallel. laxity. golem. staggered. solemn. intensity. germinates. reticule. belligerent. peril. candle. altered. disjunct. cockpit. stellar. tackle. ink. gristle. stake.
and then it was all close enough for me to fend away with my hand. one. dream after another piled up until the future filled. one. word after another piled up until the pages filled. one. sentence after another piled up until the prison filled. one. drop after another until the river filled. I saw it. I saw it all and it was. one. life after another piled up until the future filled. one. life after another piled up until the land filled. one. life after another piled up until the holes filled. one word after another piled up until the future filled one word after another piled up until the life filled one word after another piled up until the holes filled.
Travis Cebula writes and edits in Colorado. He teaches creative writing as part of the permanent faculty at the Left Bank Writer’s Retreat in Paris, France. He graduated from the MFA program at Naropa University in 2009—the same year he founded Shadow Mountain Press, a small press dedicated to the creation of hand-made editions of poetry chapbooks. He has authored four full-length collections of poetry thus far, two of which are forthcoming in 2014: One Year in a Paper Cinema (BlazeVOX) and After the Fox, a collaboration with Sarah Suzor (Black Lawrence Press).