Composition VIII
(after the painting by Wassily Kandinsky, 1923)

psychic circuitry
   the rational disarranged
neurons firing
   like old cannons
               ideas
            taking form
            w/o a name
       so many suns
mondrian gone mad—
    the end of everything
    in a flash


Crucifixion (Crois Fiction)
(after the painting by Robero Sebastián Antonio Matta 
Echaurren, 1938)

in the morning 
on golgotha
black skies
      blue
fig trees bearing  orange fruit
            redeeming stone
unwilling limbs
crowning gratitude
no room to pray—

so much for sacrifice

         my god
         my god
    why hast thou
            for-
          saken
            me


Scent of Apricots on the Fields
(after the painting by Arshile Gorky, 1947)

scent
takes form
            shape
                 in apricots
     whole          sliced
              rotting
         misshapen fruit
     yellow                  pink
still-life bouquet of reds


Full Fathom Five
(after the painting by Jackson Pollock, 1947)

the way the skin looks
      frost-bitten
    granular effusions
       Ariel’s song
            dripping nails
                          buttons
                          keys
                             &
                          cigarette butts
        skin shedding
             droplets of light


Onement, I
(after the painting by Barnett
Newman, 1948)

oh, verticality
      ascension
      heaven-bound
            descent
            to hell
   the purity of line
       up      down
as if a river flowed in red
   perpendicular
   plumb
straight to each end
   without end
   but red


Suspended
(after the painting by Franz Kline, 1953)

the square root of black
     of a square
surrounding infinite white
     holding white
suspended
     in its fist
crushing light
     cursing light
black lines
     angled to a square
forever square
     the squared root
of everything.


Messenger
(after the painting by Lee Krasner, 1959)

angels crowded on the head of a pin dancing the tango  
solemn rituals touching secret places swirling dervishes 
the face of god as if a face the messenger were real not 
you not I somewhere in the blink of an eye grinding to a 
stop there is a message there
                        there is


Elegy to the Spanish Republic, 70
(after the painting by Robert Motherwell, 1961)

death and dying
     (almost the same)
           intrusive
           blackness
   hear the cannons fire
      planes dive
      black-metal peregrines
      the night insinuates
      its own account—
save the darkness for me
eclipse of the moon
      in the morning
      free


Vert
(after the painting by Adolph Gottlieb, 1964)

even as the sun turned blue
             the sky green
     even then
             sunsets
                   shadow-filled
                   violets
             another star
             this star
             imploding
                  in memoriam 
                           ours
   filled with blue regret
       this phantom star—
remember it
             as it was
                           ours
                           no more


Song of the Nightingale
(after the painting  by Hans Hofmann, 1964)

if the nightingale could sing
     In parallel squares
                   It would
          It does
              square songs
          hovering         flight
if the squares could sing
     they would
                   and do
the song of the nightingale


Homage to the Square:  R-NW IV
(after the painting by Josef Albers, 1966) 

ambiguity in angles
edges
lines
plumb
straight to horizons
imagined and real
where the heart is
or should be
movement
almost a curve
speed standing still
shifting red to rust
the colors of time
aligned evenly                 
and composed
of parallels
where creation begins
angles and edges
where it ends
the square


Untitled (New York City)
(after the house paint and wax crayon painting 
by Cy Twombly, 1968)

the calligraphy of mind
      spells
   all things are real
   eternal
   palpable
truth in the reckoning
         trees toads & gods
         city streets
         poetry
         as well
scrawls on a sheet
hieroglyphs
revealing
what is real
         and not


Spoleto Circle 
(after the lithograph by Richard Serra, 1972)

the opposite of the opposite
is the opposite—
where to begin or end
turn
curve
spin
circumnavigate the globe
there is no place for edges
on this black marble
earth
only that we
whirl
roll
twist
faceless in a gyre
no end to this
confusion
speed back
to the start of things
still here
the opposite of black
still black


311
(after the painting by Wassily Kandinsky, 1940)

as it began
      and ending           here
where light bends around
                     the sun
swinging back upon itself
      create a universe
             fools
             harlequins
             clowns
             the scent of circus paint
             humanity
             abstracted from the flesh—
      we are what we are
      flashes in the eastern sky
      coming around again
      where we were born