smoothing two coals on a callused palm
like a monk might manage ben wa
or baoding, she
 
shot a svelte snot-rocket 
sprig of contortionist wis-
dom to anyone willing 
to grip it, 
 
like some grab 
gas or the rattle of 
latter day saints and 
still go stumbling over the 
edge of the quay or the fray
or the way suspended in
 
dust bunnies barbing a
sun beam even—I see
 
but the Salvator Mundi impressed
on a sun-plucked windshield, puckering,
laying that mudra of safety
scissors on throttling cau-
tion tape tethering toddling 
grass blades bulged about all
but expectant and unkempt concrete; see,
 
where the lips link
soil and sky, where it
reads in flint-flinched rune
stones stuttering, slurred or 
                                unrealized—see,
As above,
so below,
though know
 
that the mouth 
is the molten
navel—