And Yet Somehow I Do 
I don't want to write like a demolitionist.
It's enough to watch tulips for a morning
at the stage of late maturity
when they've opened their big pink
petals so wide
they no longer stand upright, their
inside practically out.
White triangular stigmas
sticky as innards,
powder-dusted
anthers the yellow of urine.
And as for their stems,
those gracile reeds,
too thin for
commodious head-tops.
These are the minutes before collapse.
I recognize the sign—
the feeling of being
charged at the denouement.
Divining
My name is also a truffle
you tell me
a thin
white layer
of Belgian
chocolate lacquering
dark insides.
Identical spelling as well
you tell me
would have to oracle something
and you mail me the wrapper
to read.
I once held another
object you gave me
like a geomancer's rod
hoping you would cue me
from its metal.
The humbug was
the harder I gripped,
the more
my fingers
twitched.
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