poetryrepairshop 04.03:036 Contemporary International Poetry online since 1997 Because We're Dying c2004 ANNALYNN HAMMOND

ANNALYNN HAMMOND Because We're Dying A dream: We followed a troll horse through the mountains and into the desert. There were animals with dusty flanks and hanging tongues. The sky was big and the land was long. We watched skeletons dance with flies, and then a black jaguar attacked us and we kissed as we died. Not a dream: In the morning we walked by the river. The geese had been there-- I found a feather--but by then their necks would be stretching the sky. We found a dead snake and bent over it, examining the tooth marks, turning it with sticks worn white--a dog, we decided, killing for play. I found a river rock--smooth and red. Maybe a dream: If we hold our heads up, we will see Turkey vultures, if we hold our heads down, we will find mushrooms. I taste blood in my teeth when I watch you sleeping. The sky will be big and the land will be long. Will you hold my skull to your belly? I can feel the bones in your hand.

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poetryrepairshop 04.03:036 Contemporary International Poetry online since 1997 Revelations c2004 ANNALYNN HAMMOND AllPosters.com

ANNALYNN HAMMOND Revelations I'm in one of those moods where I look for things within things, a paper plate burning in a campfire reveals a mouth widening to chase its own scream, I’ve always wondered if spirits are able to take form in these moments of fragile change, the ice is thin on the river, you can see water moving over rocks underneath, but even without movement there is change, a face in the grain of the wood shuts its eyes, a shadow sleeps in the corner, the floor sighs, I am not one to ignore the unexplained, a shock of static when thinking of ghosts, steam rising without a source, we seek the workings, the reason, didn’t she tell you of the way horses run, how their hot nostrils remind them to breathe, it is in the search with no answer, the falling of our own question, the sun sets, we crawl into darkness, the crow dies when we ask for the crow, only in the cry of what we didn’t call for, only in the image beneath, the crescent moon, perfect curve of a nipple caught by candlelight.

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poetryrepairshop 04.03:036 Contemporary International Poetry online since 1997 Wendy Hammond & Matthew Retoske c2004 Pictureshow

Wendy Hammond & Matthew Retoske Pictureshow after midnight and hours before the fall darkness leaks in through the cracks spindling this milk vessel churning black butter vagrant lovers fuck under the fire escape a pageant of Protean devotion their cries heave in two-four time night owls, perched like voyeurs unlatch their windows, heads spin skirt over hip like Saturn's rings heels kick wind skin tight on the afterburner moonlight, reflects their sex like shadow poetry calligraphic, scripted on the tautness of glassy muscles pressed against her breasts the profile of a french kiss silent-film on scorched celluloid bubbles into penetrating light heat folded into sheets, black and white tango of thorn torn tongues entombed in grainy forgotten permanence

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