Inert and surly shackles sun-sick mornings wreath
around worsted nostrils, bunged again
as the fresh-fleshed infant’s
slickly split from shadowed stocks
in writhing, thrashing throes that foremilk clots
and cloys; stiff sputum callow noses know;
wet, pealing wheeze of tummies sunken
squealing from this sapling shucked;
some succulent’s frond,
a soulful palimpsest
potted in fresher flesh—
thin, spirited forebears throwing voices sharp
as curraghs’ fey and fumbling husks
glissade across prickling crests that woefully
low and sepulchral whalesong seeps through
lissomely simple as stars unfurl
first-light’s wet, waxy olios yanked
to welcome a blithering Drummond’s glare,
learned lines, and properties scarcely panting—  

A black cat’s cringe claws corns from
barnacled glims warm, slumberous seas encrust
and caulk like shades drawn taut and stickily
stitched in sand-chewn sills, stripped jambs that,
erstwhile threadbare, longing lenses slowly smeared
to summon in scintillant swathes iconic,
echoic, and nacreous glimmers
some vitreous gods, among glib gambols,
skimmed from filigreed waves what
bleary horizons gleeked, then gulped and gushed with—
stirring still this frothing day,
which wets wan napes with labored breathing, begging
fingers visions sutured stiff as
ships sharp, shore-bound crags upend,
to grope about auric ears and flaccid,
foetid, quern-cracked grist, 
or whatever enshrouds what bison once
would roll about dreamily dreeing grasses’
graceful lilt and sapid sway,
what writhing plains that sobering Kansas claims
and cramps, encages, blears by but a name
old, restless soldiers stole,
allured by illegible lines of a free state—  

unfold those curling portals shrieks inflame
and sting as sullied scratches swell;
abide by what a tabby tells,
in jabbing her graven M,
slid smoothly as planes
lathe bumpy boughs of
driftwood, stamping
redundant as stammering,
diffident voices clamp at
mnemonic anemones enemies hem and indemnify,
raking inky rills of acrid mmm’s
through a furrowing scowl’s
bleak, chasmal creases:
a cat’s percussive nuzzle cribs
like blades ensnared in stridulous scrimshaw.  

Knaves at play cold mornings wrought
in gnashing asyndeton streaking,
bald and raw, what soft parts freaking
cracked macadam some strawberry roan;
now, a kitten knows how laws are bent,
how claws are buffed and whetted snapping
rickety ribs of a rambling orrery;
Kittens arch and belly with low mincing moons,
in gambols grey and gay,
in stardust stylish quiffs most moon-borne
rabbits scorn and discreetly covet,
and every gilt, Jellico earmark
slumberous tails ensnare come shadowless hours
that charred macadam must melt and kvetch with—
lour at powerless rabbits proudly, 
weed-wracked, cracking, cross if crossed,
and always crossed, and never acknowledged, 
an aggregate Atlas smoothed from molten stone
no sole should deign to polish.
 
There upon the ragged bluff
our star’s brash, rankling ankles stab,
alights amid onerous crepitus creeping
murder ballads grackles bay
and, bothering low-borne blood to boil,
wry clarity emeralds bend and tinge,
blithe sunrise prying glims to seethe
when weighing clots of powdery tuna,
salvaging glaucous flesh from sunken peaches,
skulking, scarring navels bared, and
brandishing bilboes blood inspires
long and thrawn as borders’ stories sicken,
mere lice-lengths shy of empurpled shells
a twig, a lash, an asthmatic breath
could tease to share sweet, supple pearls
a kitten’s nail, unclipped, should wantonly puncture—
or deign to benight the world.  

A baby bunny bolting from but silent sighs of slouching gates,
this cold and unplumbable grog one greets the quay with,
harbored along bright Hellespont’s beachhead;   
Or, as my darling swears,
You’re only ever distracted
from the beauty,
and nary by beauty misled.