Dancing Where the Tile Caught Fire
Jason Wilkinson

They sought us
among a chasm of lampposts
breaching the pale thicket
sinews fled in time there
were storied glances,
paper turrets motionless ecstasy forever
tangible pneumatic eidolon censers
misspelled halberds of smoke
expiring in a long, lonesome train

Deceiving the muse Her tangled thread writhing between the toes of a bare foot
lifts grey pearl scented the weightlessness I fancy
that while you steer
the unlacquered chant,
faraway bells
teaming in their hollow
chorus we
breathe plumes of maudlin fame

Through a beach chair her shoestring gems washed
wavelets of spent chloroform
barbs honed into a derisive smile
plywood stapled frames curl against the wind

Her hair a daft copse of impossible heather

By vague portents made reckless
hale, scribbled men
apoplectically chasing those
trellised bowers that
flexure beyond hills
like a series of painted
on fabric globes dancing
where the tile caught fire

Bullets in the snow
yet for all of our
tergiversation that measured
paucity of worn things,
the calenture remains fixed and
misanthropically driven.

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