First poem of 2010

year of the bat
the night before the fall of wilusa

So. The empty set has ceased to exist.
A fine mist settles on the windowsills,
chalk dust settles on superalgebras,
discursive systems, pictographic fields
that yield insight on a handful of gold,
a fist of lapis lazuli ground down
to pigment the eyes of our heads of state.

The hour grows late. Sinon at the gate
watches waves roll along the Hellespont,
dreams of hunting in high crags, nets cast out,
prow pointed west. The son of Aesimus
waits in the waning light. These walls will fall.

Next. Twenty will go back to ten. Again,
what has gone on before will soon happen
in similar shades, vows made will soon fade.
The code will be unbroken. Cyclical,
we will ride through the park singing Chaucer,
bathing with our wives in run-off trenches,
sleeping like dead kings on streetside benches.

The blue moon finds Sinon standing alone,
unnerved by the dream in his heart of Rome,
unnamed but sighted in sleeping Trojans
whom fate remakes. He knows some will escape.
The levy will break; the lights will blink out.

Last. There is no sun (it's the back of the moon)
nor is there wind (it's the breath of the gods)
nor are there numbers (we count stars in vain)
nor is there reason for our hearts to fail.
Our calculations hurtle us toward this
last question of cause and effect. Stiff-necked
but softened in our hearts. Now, we can start.