Abraham Smith




why stack this
in a neat little pile
on the floor by the records
that you and only you
know how to sing to
having learned all the skips
as little goings quiet and wet
the dust where this was
if you like i
squeamish memory
squeeze hands first into
hearts then potatoes
escape it by coughing or
any little key caulk jocular song
darling readying the tshirts
they will have a sunset
we will correct people
ruddy sunrise actually
fact that eyebrow ain't
trough for sojourning monarch
means handsome trap
for sweat some jelly teeth
crown o' gliding fang
as we yes yes no from
the latest in a clear stretch
before dark woods
dark lite afterthoughts of
explosion wroth
remnant microphone
cords everywhere
retract retrace
is it we are too animal ever to
butter feather into the room
where crooners stare
rare holes in smoke
and red red lips
button nest
little murders
to the edges of glass




the crows are i am home
as in i go to the rib doctor
in taos tell him pull one
i go to the duck decoy doctor
with that no laugh
or deep breath for at
least six weeks rib north of
minneapolis tell her
whittle me a wind wanderer
i go to the glassblower md
boston by way of fayetteville
tell him blow me a dip vessel
bout the size of the pineal and i
go to the big printer makers
before you homogenize the inks
in them big expense cubes i am as in
an animal under the leaves
am the leaves for all the eye
and the leaves ain't worth
thinking about since milton so
mind if i siphon a bag of
your rawest finest so
so home in crow as in yard chicken
eggs for breakfast
them yokes blood orange
they candle the heart
them kids five things
every morning
lamb duck mama to plastic waa waa lion train




i thank god for the limits to my nose
for the dumbing of the breeze
will the road to the sleeper 
seeks it clean 
rotten ruby ring was a wire talk 
do you wear that 
to your mouth for a wound or is there 
some current thing the smaller 
the tighter the turn of the trapped 
so fat with rinse
as to be shiny glad? in their clocking 
tell you what 
stone bend road 
pretty lie of a row this way 
that ice needs stoves 
you could eat off 
the pasture weeds and play 
you were captain of the cod 
none in the cloud kit stupid 
no one poisoned the whey 
the storm pork wasn't gypsum 
for factory belly scratch scrap 
frap pistol pop off all y'all 
out of my apple trees 
you got the milk from my daisy
you don't need god telling me
i got a sweetheart 
in indy and her too




careful i enjoy darkness
most ink favorers do 
so something brighter like healthy gums 
pink shower curtain 
a plastic one 
gliding along behind a big boat in the ocean 
gonna catch me a thousand underarms 
right square in the no get away cheek 
for there lie the bibles and 
burbles babbles and towering 
bubble climb of what mouths did 
in the light and in lit dark 
but mouths do nothing without hands 
and hands are only fish 
upon the waters of the mind 
and no water hasn't current save 
puddles and springless ponds and puddles 
are only the past tense of driving rain 
and anything past is now when spoken 
so i think we have sufficiently 
updated puddle ponds are for looking at 
the message is relax or 
easy to recognize on 
country people they stink 
dog is optional for knowing that 







Abraham Smith
hails from Ladysmith, Wisconsin. His third book, Only Jesus Could Icefish in Summer, will appear in 2014 from Action Books. Smith is Instructor of English at University of Alabama.