Summer oracle

Without expectation
there is no end
to the shocks of morning
or even a small summer.

Now the image is fire
blackening the vague lines
into defiance across the city.
The image is fire
sun warming us in a cold country
barren of symbols for love.

Now I have forsaken order
and imagine you into fire
untouchable in a magician’s coat
covered with signs of destruction and birth
sewn with griffins and arrows and hammers
and gold sixes stitched into your hem
your fingers draw fire
but still the old warlocks shun you
for no gourds ring in your sack
no spells bring forth peace
and I am still fruitless and hungry
this summer
the peaches are flinty and juiceless
and cry sour worms.

The image is fire
flaming over you burning off excess
like the blaze planters start
to burn off bagasse from the canefields
after a harvest.

The image is fire
the high sign that rules our summer
I smell it in the charred breeze blowing over
your body
close
hard
essential
under its cloak of lies.