Zion Offramp 103.
see
now a man stretched
out
in the snow in
the
photo under the snow
maybe
two inches a man
dead
maybe a soldier black
bulk
volume outlined by white
ground
two inches trees black
verticals
the road’s snow-filled ruts
scorched
metal twist smoking cairns
the
eclipse at its totality
says
literally fuck you Hegel
sea
glass and broken oyster
shells
footpaths between parterres shrubs
in
topiary and espaliered pears
they
were brought to break
these
shells spread that sand
gathering
point or point to
be
gathered avid and narrow
at
a distance it happens
again
history images or words
video
clips in my hand
under
suburban trees history is
what
hurts we weren’t meant
to
live through history were
born
in the run up
to
history’s end they said
your
end time and mine
I
said to a woman
at
the bar one waiting
for
triumphant return the other
convinced
it’s all spinning into
chaos
entropy heat-death in reverse
that
chain-link fence sagging rusty
must
have been when first
raised
as clear and shining
as
a fresh swimming pool
profluent
bulbs icebreak February ajar
siren
intermittencies from the avenue
greased
slide of taxis over
pavement
plates and the repeated
reminder
that past is past
brick
wall of habit brick
wall
of sheer inborn limitation
missed
opportunities and malformed diplomacies
constellation
of disapproving winking lights
they
bear down forty miles
long
punctuated by quagmires smoke
distorted
fruits of maintenance neglected
ill-tuned
piano to serenade danseur
and
rumpled poet emigré fifty
years’
grainy monochrome gaze totality
like
a punching bag wades
back
to spar voided evaded
expired
despite fresh signature elapsed
snowdrops
shoulder aside the mulch
at
the still-bare ash’s foot
a
vivid crocus phalanx crowds
the
waking rose’s bright knees
I
worry at salt stains
on
boot leather squint anticipate
the
next two inches across
competing
fronts the sightless lines
scoring
apart cold divided air
daffodils
and magnolia blossoms punctuate
the
raw air yearling Leicester
Longwools
toll a nasal baritone
and
a congeries of machinery
branded
Caterpillar deftly sifts gravel
from
truckbed to parterre thumbprints
of
Africa in ever brick
the
carefully laid courses burnt
ends
alternating narrow cinnabar lengths
beachhead
of empire empire’s theme
park
the spasm’s pain domesticated
and
bleached two weeks in
and
already the vital agonies
beneath
two inches of snow
become
habituated distanced the steppe’s
chill
blown across the fancy
dining
room candles cannot cool
double
espressos and Earl Grey
when in the course graven
bronze
image golden calf lawgiver
the
Marquis de Lafayette ends
his
recollections with as expected
a
patriotic hymn j’ai deux
patries as do we all
imagined
community community of the
real
the broken cross its
shadow
snow on half-sunk faces
see
now a man stretched
half
sunk in melted snow
water
black phone shorted out
face
curve white swollen video
clip
in my hand history
is
late snowfall after early
snowdrops
magnolia crocuses and sundry
triumphant
returns shouldering compost aside
sleepless
the furnace creaks hums
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Mark Scroggins’s most recent books include Damage: Poems 1988-2022 (Dos Madres Press), Zion Offramp 1-50 (MadHat Press), and Arcane Pleasures: On Poetry and Some Other Arts (Selva Oscura/Three Count Pour), a collection of essays and reviews. He lives in Montclair (NJ) and Manhattan.