Charles Mahaffey
2019 - poetry
a train turns off its light finds its tunnel down the long groove in midnight groping
grasping navigating slow slow nocturnal purple coal plumes if you
remove the rails and their flexing wood ties still without lines still comes
daybreak an oval opening comes suns arching back comes horizon lines folded over forms swallowing themselves
a train on an all night tulip petals tucked like knuckles huddled
scraping a tendril sky there are no instructions on how to spread pollen there is
only the undulating hustle of locomotives stroking bees wings a seed must be carried on the
tongue then buried blind a bulb inside a vascular womb
everything takes the shape of an ‘O’ if its spun a barreled body taken head on
rings inside an ear shaking pennies pressed into oval palms leave rose red imprints when a
train enters a body through the eye the mind flips it over to scribble circles on its back
there is no vowel sound without at least fifteen degrees of curve in its mouth in the
dark inattentive tongues pointed out looka soft pilled pink a line emerging in the
night.