JON CURLEY

Metafizzles


corona
seeks immensity
of peace’s pleroma

gnostic
nostrums of
illuminated manuscripts ripped

heretics
have heritage
in heart’s healing

codex
composed discomposed
written rewritten revised

two
martyrs turned
on burning wheels

if
one should
stay soul, shade

imprimatur
your flesh
penned rosy filigrees

whether
fathom beyond
still defy gravity

cannot
see so
mind wears visions

next
place new
grace for All

Weil
wore woe
weal like wheel

lustrations
pour rain
onto mire (mine)

afresh
flowers bloom
from thorn crowns

meaning
no matter
in the hereafter

sightings
of no
saints just selves

rainbow-
beaked revenants
inscribed beside text

from
cloister to
coracle, sail on

summons
where you
seek new thoughts

fructify
benevolence growing
misshapen in present

end
no end
bend in path



***

Profiles


how
Howe’s words
whir into souls

when
Samuel Menashe
lost for afternoon

Heaney
hastened poetic
practice in me

Medbh
at NYU
a randy lass

Nuala
saved me
from my selves

Kimmelman’s
mother poem
on Garrison Keillor!

Welshman
R.S. Thomas
at final reading

Heller
my mentor
means much more

Augustine
not saint
but poet Jane

Otoliths
inner ear
definitely Mark Young

Silliman
no silly
man, a thunderstorm


Talisman
Ed fosters
no frivolous work

speaking
tongues with
her hands: Lauterbach

scribe
describes Finkelstein’s
sacred text, vocation

saw
Tabios at
Poets House: wow!

jazzman
Paul Pines
actually sonic poet

Austin’s
Gg Re
a mischief monument

missed
the “the”—
Les Murray’s poem!

Gizzi
almost taught
me, the Unteachable

Thom
Gunn never
responded: no postage?





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