TODD SWIFT
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Beginning

If there must be grass, let it be turquoise;
If light is required at the commencement,
Let it liquefy itself like ice in amber heat;
If water should be summoned, summon it
With mandolins, sea-cymbals: make noise.
Should the sun be needed to sanctify what
It beats on, as heaven’s biggest drum kit,
Bring it on, led by nine purpling stallions.
If there is any demand for The Word, stall:
The only word we have is one size fits all.
Mutter the lush names of the fish and fowl
As if they were lost varieties of vermilion;
Start the world with slow boa constrictors
That seize gem-small beasts, losing poise.

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Marcus Makepeace

Dr. Ezekiel Lightning’s Players left their snail meniscus
Behind with cat-o-nine-marks upon Makepeace’s loins.

A troupe of tall wrestling women dressed like Lincoln
The night he died: theatrical this; and Marta Monocle

Who was said to have sirloin-branded the devil: an S
Beef-sizzled on that red character’s tan hide. Marcus

Hissed his pleas to Jesus to be freed from promises
Made in Madame SoSos billowing tent, fiery-lit by

Wax made from the bees that had fattened on flowers
Growing by the very cross on which our Saviour died.

The honey-blood scent of those candles—Little Assia
Largent dealing cards—the chips made from narwhal

Tusk (some claimed unicorn)—while Dexter Oliphant
And his Amazing Ambidextrous Sinners deviated a bit

From the norm, guzzling gazelle mucus from a horn.
The very scene master Hieronymus had dreaded was

Now the fire-curtain on which our friend wept and lay,
As if twin juggling harpies from Norway had born him

A noseless son, who would cut and shuffle angel bones.
He bawled in his stovepipe mewing for fiends to revisit.

 

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