Perish song
by Dylan Buckser-Schulz
I woke today in Tuscany
from a memory
that involved you
and a feeling
of abandon. Where are you
my dream I thought
uselessly
and looked
outside the window
to find a pair
of black songbirds
in a shared dive,
tethered
by a force
we know: four dusky wings
like a switch knife,
their dark sheen
unlatching,
latching in the morning
light. There is a sharpness
and a refusal
to cut. I love you
and there is
a cost.
Where I Saw A Heart You Saw A Shark Tooth
by Dylan Buckser-Schulz
Craned and beholden we watch
dark glacial clouds
settle heavily
in the heaven-cloth. I ask
you about fortune, our backs
soaked with grass
like cash. Can we afford
stain remover? You answer
not. The sky, too, is frugal
in its colors that stash
the stars. Colors,
though, that shine, inky
and terrific, like the artisanal
fabric of the universe. About
beauty: people build
it, passion
strokes dripped
with a place
in mind. You’ve seen
the Sistine Chapel. You’ve worn
makeup. Divinity,
though, is in the eye: look
hard and find the astral blue
veil that intercedes
what you can see—what I
can’t. God—it hits
you. See, I understand
a wave, but not
where it goes: I ran
a wet hand through
her hair to get the sand out
of you. Sight-lines
dissolve
in recollection—and there
is a solution. One body retracting
from the tide line. One sky breaking
like bread to reveal
warmer, richer
skies. All this
to say, that cloud could be
a heart, that cloud
could be a shark
tooth. You and I
try the difference
—where God is.