Late Ghost (poem © 2008)

From: The Transcendence, La Salle University Press © 2008

growling storm clouds amass above the pinnacles of my masts
and the cold water, so recently calm, now churns and seethes
the silver crescent, shimmering listlessly upon the waves, asks me:
rogue-poet, toward what shore are you travelling?
I answer, away to a country that is like an oasis at the bottom of the sea
a fecund moment of lucidity amid the dark hadalpelagic confusion
whence philosophies ever-new ride desert tides
to conquer the transitory empires of littorality
and in that ancient yet re-virginal place
I hope to hear a qasida that can slay eternity

the liquid skin of the planet-monster begins to undulate violently
I sense the primordial heart thunder within the surging swells
and the beast’s saline breath billows savagely against my sails
then upon the sponson appears a diaphany in a moonlit dress
—spectral metonym for unplumbed psychic depths—
she lunglessly speaks: I’m sorry I didn’t get your message
I was in the basement ‘til midnight just sewing things
my sister bought me a new sewing machine yesterday
maybe we’ll talk today, I’ll try to phone you tonight
I’m never too sure how late is too late

the ocean, vast facelessness, its tongue licking my keel
teeth made of sharks, abyssalpelagic spittle frothing upon my prow
for fleeting human memories hungers this ancient shai-huludian maw
I’m eating the rest of the stale pretzels you never took with you, she says
I wish you were here to eat these pretzels with me
my sloop, defiant, crashes through the foamy crest
sprays of salt blasting my eyes, stinging, blinding—
the salt might just taste like salt if you were here
—no! I’ll not be descending to the depths tonight
for I’ve already lost so many unspoken words, all drowned in the raining years!

steering my frail vessel through the onslaught of the Tiamatic monsoon
Scylla behind me, roaring the agonies of my past—and ahead yaws Charybdis
rogue-poet, laughs the moon, where is your harpoon?
she was always too late in everything she did
too late, too fearful, too frigid, too frail
there was so much life to live had she not been so busy sewing in her hell
I plug my ears and cry: my harpoon is hatred for all things endless
“to the last I will grapple with thee; from hell’s heart I stab at thee!”
and white-knuckling my tiller, I plunge into the dread vortex, riding the centrifugal fury
on the other side the storm relents, and ahead of me I can finally see: the shore