Brine

snow is coming
so are trucks carrying
glacial tons of salt to season
winter and cure streets
with brine

sifted from brackish deep
magma-heated seafloor seeps
a winnowing of waves, dissolved
ions feeding the feast of seven
Christmas fishes

who crave salinity – cod, mussels
conch and squid – crystals
for scallops and clams
and preventing icy skids

an ocean over asphalt that by dawn
will gnaw and gnash primordial shark
teeth, unleash the thermal sting
of ray and eel and thaw its sister sea
of winter whitecaps

this is a Bauhaus love affair

      form
following function, no frothy
flirtation, no rococo romance
just the allure of essentials

      show
me your etchings
your Kandinsky-keen slants
your curves and your cants
we align, you and I, all

symmetry
and order, all angles and poise
sleek in efficiency and primal
simplicity, with mattress as

      canvas
in abstract attraction we converge,
curated – lip to neck, collarbone
to calf, eye to thigh, straight edge to

      sigh
with rule and compass sketch
a schematic of e-zones, Klee edges
and us falling to

      plumb
mathematically inspired
the gestalt of desire
this is a Bauhaus
love affair

there are foxes now

            we weren’t sure at first, they move so quick
the size of pets or tender prey, and we’re unaccustomed
to the flick of tail and straight-arrow flight – a blur of liquid amber
streaking across yards

            or associative memory, the pinball ping
of unrelated things – tattoo of inked feathers, a hatchet
moon swaying in winter sky, the cardinal north quiver
of a silver compass

            leading you in the ways of shamans, trailing mystic
wisps of incense, the goatskin beat of bomba drums, the flesh-
and fur-weave of metamorphosis that makes you trust
the beguiling dusk dancer

            and then you rouse from imagining and realize
you’ve lost track of the prize, the slyboots ruse of disappearing
into wood with the hint, the glint, the tease of follow me please
and you’re left wondering what it might portend to see
or believe in foxes

January 25, 2025