To Anchor the Swarm, Its

Ann Lauterbach

1.

 

tacit aggregate      to find

                                      owl choir

and the dead     what December knows

arrested under         a       carapace of light

                                       scent of fir

              not anything    yet born

                the son  a daughter   or

unspoken       owl choir            near

call        and      in the ebb of night

               linear purple at the horizon   wing sloped

                      possible tune among minor chords


                       what diction had once

                                               what Emerson

 

and the abbreviations of

              the unjustly slain


                       dropped down among stones

             most common waves

                       syntax unwoven

washed up as scenes    whose eyes

       multiply you          and the aluminum bed turned

                 girl running down a hall

and the bullets       the pearls

         freeze in the mighty as if


                         black floor    sprung   door to door

gist     delayed among welcomes

         patterns  open

                  Bach     cello arcs    and


Gould’s             phantom breath

                                                              drawings on the wall

 


                       so  the hand is motion

 

        elusive givens

                            sleeve

                                    caught on a nail


          mandate shredded against history

                                                that mirage


 geographies as maps  open into

                                                  the abundant false near


                                      intimate scale

                         in the dead of night

the lost key to Dublin’s sorrow

 

      and the evicted

                                    saved         diaspora      word

                                            hope  hopes

                    trials that await good


                         to inform  these letters

up over      for the other     plural  web


                     to dwell        a phrase


          shell and sail


small wind

absolute clarity         to set out


                           modes of          retrieval


as        the Hudson’s impassive stare

                                     ludic cry          scarce   wagered   unfixed

                        such old particulars

          salvaged

                                  from the quotidian

 

 

             its categorical yes

                         spelled out      as gift


what turbulent vistas       the raptor swerves

              crow and buzzard

                     and the sign of the heron


                               O pond life     O lilies

 

             roads, roads, roads

                       hoarding their kill

 

                               damaged speech

             sworn in among initiates

 

             what guests

                          in the circuitous iterations of law

                                                folded as in a box


             the impatient ban

                            reductive pixels

 

                                        captured in time’s open mouth

                                                             and that which is feared


                                                                                  is kissed.

 

 

2.

 

Thing life      construed      as frequency


these small patterns   to see


      shift as the perceived 


                           intent


              my own shown among them


their inanimate                embodied welcome


                    and so would put down      put down


their relation or       assent    


         ocean unfolded as veils of salt 


         salt poured into a cloudy glass


         the very taste of blue


                                     and in the dream slot  


an immense cloth  


                           blown  


         place to place what is so     is     what is


     and depends


                to bring these intuitions


           in the demeanor of a search


to look for         to scan


pie cabinet  

spool of black thread

yellowing page

flooded street

photo of a girl

drawings of an insomniac

cry of the jay


icy step                   riot in the square


             flood


the near

as the waters recede


              to save 


          atomic gloss      rapacious thrust

 

the one by one          among us


little cousins, little citizens of death


unnamed along these distributions  


                 ignition of skies


                            sliced into      apophatic plateaus


common as dust          and those


                      who chose       did not choose


                  leave us


bereft among planets, casting our


                                                                                   simple awes


                     error, stitch, error, stitch, stitch


into whatever is                     next.