STONED IN THE VALLEY – Brooke Nicole Plummer

September 7, 2020

All cerebral, hiss, & pang // I am overlooking the valley, where the blind falcon caws in stationary flight, with eyes like crystal balls pending // And if poetry is many hearts like embers // spit from talons & in plenary recoil // as long as there is to be written // the sodden nectary where I hinder light I’ve failed // light I’ve lost // light I’ve consecrated // I’ve attuned my radiuses to whiskey // to lake-allaying jouissance // cross-fade immediacy // & all abandon from what is raw, degenerate Scripture // My father went // for no road was behind him // no road ahead at all // Now, I wear the brogue // reeling all the tenses // kissing the whole length of wind // which is swallowing all that I am // but my world will have lasted longer // All that light with its sermonizing // its fraying of my bone’s bastard font // my body black-boxed // unbaptized by any a common descent // Every morning // a torn, luminous sentence // the aired-cotton rise, the-black-&-blue-lace blur of time’s long, ravening spine // what we earn through each incalculable trough!

II.

Tongues slid in-between speech like a shuddered myth // like climbing trees, blood-handed // in search for syllables of salt-broken minerals //Then I: the tall grass inward, the moth-lick of a milky sap, the blacktop upon in pale stillness, praying // I tend to a harvest of memory // & in many ways, feel as a murmur of dead ends // & in others, I am eligible for night words that fire up at dusk // an entry of the fated // maybe God is elusive enough to leave me creviced & phlox esoterica // Before the black hole swallows the bond in which I’ve been contemplative with all of this // maybe, God . .