GRACE FOR A DAY OF STARCH
Reflecting emotion, every scowl and grin
runs along the grain of the carved mask,
parallels the dance of painted wooden faces
sings that smirk-of-paradise song
sends one impulse both dead and alive,
the trill of fibers, up the tree of life
to King of Thorn, his glory and pathos
hinged on a minor third, a note's difference,
a drone of muffled brain-music, the common urge,
one sliding oily surge of gray thunder
passing like a rumor with stars to throw,
gnawing at heaven's flesh with the same flame,
the same dust, the same roar of blood.
Her secrets in full slithering array
the Goddess, Bride of Thorn's wormy sex,
and slippery agents, curdling ooze,
ghost of the beast in a scar, curled in a hair,
cries out sweetly from potato starch
crunching like the tide of a rusty red soil
humped and forked madly with pagan ritual,
or mistaking the whole universe, it bears stars
like fruit on the gods' frumpy little trees.
