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                           _________________________________

Raymond Farr

Raymond Farr lives in Ocala, FL. His work appears in print at Poet Lore, Cider Press Review, Crucible, and online at Stirring, Shampoo and 2River.

So this is the story native to our tales of summation.
Its teller no longer fixates on nine specific glances
at an oleander but dives intentionally into confusion,
meaning he translates dual ambiguous notations
like a spent nomad finding a home at last, settling
first drafts down upon a forgotten plain of existence.
"Know-how," said the fire-storm. "Incomparable lines.
Or a writer who thirsts." But what of the bells and
whistles that condone the heaviness after love-making?
It's not flesh beyond meaning that meanders sideways,
usurped by atmospherics in a cheap set of sheep's
clothing but tells of itself something believable,
though false by its true nature which seems invisible,
terrible, and yet noble because of its battle against
context; the shape of the world falters around it
like a bee with its one goal in mind: an oleander or
the rest of the day, by which time regards itself as
a beauty. If only the senses we regard the bee with,
and by extension ourselves, were the beauty of one
nature, and only one nature, and not a hopeless com-
posite of opposites—an oleander's sexual petals
in summer vs. this poem's long shadow plotting a kiss
toward eventual shapelessness—our darkest hours'
unlivable dimension would seize upon an oleander's
reapable glowing, the only wildcard the parable's
ending, believable as fact bordering on uncertainty.
It's knowledge that idealizes, that artfully contemplates
oleanders, making language specific. And writing
about them, and loving them, dangerous as avoidance.