pure tangent to 
the undulating wave
of your life on this earth,
the photograph travels straight,
a linear compression of time,
hallucination made paper

were you ever that young
                    that pregnant
                         that happy

such a fiery thing,
flaming wrecks of photons
collide with silver halide ions
shattering electrons free
charring tiny silver grains 
fixing that half smile forever

push your eye against the print
and it's just patterns, dark and light, 
pebbles of grain
how do they stack up to build 
that smile, that love in your eyes

memory is charred blackened meat
burnt paper, image rescued from crushing time
by permanent scarring violence

it's just a clock for seeing
a frame of fire
that puts my eye in the past

-jm2.9

Listen-- the faucet
has rusted closed,
words only drip out
until the metal gives way,
squealing-- chunks
of rust color the sputtering
red briefly, but soon
a clear torrent will pour,
unstuck words flow
quickly, forcefully,
and you may miss
the comforting drip
of the rust-closed faucet.

The basin overflows, the rug
is ruined with mold and damp--
the flood is what we feared,
too much, too much, too much.

That's why we let our mouths
fill with rust, our jaws seize up
our cups run dry
but the pressure doesn't abate--
it pushes out through the eyes.

The tearduct on the upper lid
keeps us lubricated and dust-free.

The one on the bottom
keeps us from exploding.

-jm1.9