Douglas Culhane

Map

The map becomes a lady’s voice.

The map becomes a pattern.

The map becomes a replica of the lines

on the palm of your hand,

of the lines you transcribed in your mind, backwards.

And you obey the voice and you drive the car

and you forget the pattern and you exchange

the lines on the palm of your hand

for another diagram.

The map becomes your home.

The map becomes a number of numbered incidents.

The map becomes instructions, becomes a pattern.

The map resides where you reside.

And you forget the map and betray the residence

and dissolve the details into dust.

The map becomes the day, becomes the light

 – and its absence and opposite – the night.

The map becomes the trees,

a hive of bees, the body of Christ.

The map becomes the weather,

a broken kite, a list of rumors,

a patch of ice.

Epilogue

They tired of my tales

from the forest, elliptical recitations,

triplet refrains of milk, teeth, blood

& rain rain rain.

The beast who thrashed

& wailed in the briar

where the owls called indifferently.

The boy turned into a warbler,

a fox, a snake, a hare, swallowed whole

& disgorged to the song of a hunting knife.

While clouds told fortunes –

rain tomorrow, three deaths

by the end of the year – mice wove

charms in the grass, weasels

ate nestlings, lit fires, cursed crows,

chased their tails into the night.

& the children seek delusion, fairyland

treasure, monsters, drugs, on their way

to some imposter paradise.

I watch it snow, feed my fire bark

& twigs, it snaps & glowers

like an ill-tempered lap dog.

The coldest shadow casts

its spell, a winter long enough for me

to sleep one hundred years.

While

Wait white whiter

falling & cold rising

ghost of the Sun                                

ash twig ever for

day for broken

start the sound

Wait where whether

odd numbers in a row

or branching structures                  

seen & imagined

seen & notated in

a code of matter

Wait while wilder

inverted birds

a sign of night

intervals of air and water                

of breathing between worlds

fire on the edge

and moving closer

frag.

a very tiny child

crushed

not a child, but a wren

crushed

in an eggshell

still asleep

Fugitive

A pink birthday cake

with a file baked in it

While the guards slept, I worked

(moonlight, winter night)

Thank you for the cloak

you left outside my window

ermine invisible in snow

Thank you for the cake

5 Blakean Riddles

?

What verb or bird now sits at six

(eleven elves halved twelve)

and shifts a bit

?

What paint or pain

(star scar brushed far)

will hold a ship above the rain

?

What beast will feast upon the day

(one sun for none done)

and stop the movement of a ray

?

What day will strike to stir and start

(blood good moon wood)

within the thicket of the heart

?

What witch will wait with

(listening last and listing in)

the crackling code to keep the fire lit

?

3 Wishes 

1.

For the third wish

three more wishes

or three thousand

or three hundred thousand more times

for the world to submit to the will

We know how this ends

2.

It fell, the first of winter

three billion flakes

or three inches cover or

enough to silence the witness

of the burned down forest

Water frozen in your footprint

3.

Snow drugs the hills

downs the power lines

eats the world with light

It was what you wanted

by the window, in the morning

It was all you ever wished for