Song Cycle for Baritone and Piano

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Home and still homesick

Wasn’t there a waterfall?
Something’s missing, and I think it’s the sound
of water hitting stone and sand and other water.
Were there supposed to be bells?
Something’s missing, and it might be the sound
of metal shaking eardrums and air and other metal.

Everything feels like closing eyes
and wishing
and not opening them for fear
of something missing.

(I’m homesick for everywhere that almost felt like home).
The clouds should stretch like Sunday morning,
like dreams in half-light, on every surface.
The walls, if there are walls at all, should be always
cool to the touch, no matter where you trail your fingers.

Everything feels like closed eyes
and too much quiet.
Where is the water and the metal
and the wall with something cool inside it?

The Bulldozer

The world roars and I wake

to the sky falling in. Unpinned,

it drops, swallowing the walls

that have always edged my vision.

There, in their place, outlined against

the flat white of the hungry sky,

is a monster, twice my size, yellow

with too many teeth for me to fight.

The roar stops and leaves a ringing

I can’t think around. A man

steps out of the monster…

He turns toward light

and suddenly moon is sleeping in his mouth

as if in a cave at night

somewhere warm and south.

Knoxville

To explore a city, you must leave the apartment.

To leave the apartment, you must have gas in the car,

you must know where the car keys are,

you must leave the dog behind. To leave the dog behind

without her crying, you must give her something to eat,

you must move everything else that a dog could eat

out of reach. At this point, you’ve thought about food

too many times not to be hungry…

My

mother

cuts my meat

for me, the knife

sinking in the turkey,

and I’m in the maze again,

playing what I thought was a

game as the two of us chased the

children of Attica. She cut my meat…