Mani Rao

From the manuscript of Ghostmasters

Shorts

Some deaths are well-dressed
Butterflies neatly folded
000Some have banners
000One ragged wing banging in the wind

One by one the petals bowed
Such polite timing
We gave each its due
000Now uncapped
000The smiling pod seedy teeth
000The old bitter-gourd
000Shaking to be a rainstick

On the contrary when
You are dying you change
To prose
000The family finds out who gets what
000You are finally understood

Worker

Pressed poet
Having to thing poems
The lights are off
Speak in your own person

Anon – Nonym – Nymous
Strong Weak Relative Nons
Us Them Impersonyms
Hate Like Ignoranymous

Many master words

Poet – pretender
Light – thunder

Permit no ambit
Even loser's glory

Humility:
Prolog's cunning
Epilog's arrogance

Stay young fox don't learn panic

That I think it is not to be feared does not mean I don't fear it. I used to be someone. I placed so
0000much value on it I acted humble, prefacing the admission of my fortune with 'undeserved'. How
0000low an opinion I had of myself that I became satisfied.

Art Artifice log away

§

As soon as you start to read my poem I start to feel fond about you

0000000000Do you believe in love

0000000000the small l
0000000000those little fires
0000000000much huddling

0000000000two tossed aquariums in the ocean

0000000000Love|lies
000000000000000000000000All|lies

Outside The Aviary
Two Freewheeling Snowplumes
Interlocked
Coi !
Ploded Verges
Flurry In The Cages
The Sky Separated In To Two
The Nets High00000 Humane

Across The Room. Hair Moon Clouds. Smile Said Between You And I. Sudden Gun And
0000Shot. Eyes Jumped Water. Why The Sidelong Glance. A Line Between Mountain And
0000Ground. The Range Watched. Grew. Not The Size The Lightness. Not The Lightness
0000The Shapeliness. Not The Shapeliness The Sharpness. Not Of A Rumble. Of A Sesame Seed.
0000Itch Around Which Forms Grain. Need Wind Not Water. Light Sway. Upward
0000Stroke. Eye Open Dumbell.

Two Rings. Mortal § Immortal. Soft Flame. Fingernail Size.

∞

Flashfires
Not much writing
Greek plays – accounts of murders done off stage
Why I find toes weird because I don’t use them
Why I fish without bait because I love jaws

Heart’s enlarged
Do I have to have it out
The having to honor what
means nothing but what
not honoring does not mean

Triumph threw me
Out on my ass

Ears blown
Lay throbbing

Tumortime
∞ I was supposed to swallow

Wait for the webs
Maggotflowers

Gratitude for the gone
Unsummonability

Airing at a sniff

Easy in the envelope of your hands
Rewinding to the memoir
The glyph in your graze

Rrrrrip
Rrrrrip
Rrrrrip

E a s y000 I said to the deaf habit of a jawdisc
What’s the hurry
The season sprawls

My fiber was coarse
All five: flavor color odor vibre texture

We ran amok dusting air unsettling
And now bereft jumped on the moon
Straycow
Honeybell
What else to do but ruminate

Come graze ghost bees
About time

Void Plate

When the gates of spring squeaked in the mouths of birds I put out a hand
Sunflower seeds embedded in my flesh
A bare-breasted mother re-filled the feeder with liquid suet
Fat River Love
Fire Forest

O the knots on Osage for fire to suckle
Sootfaced I stood uncurling fruitdrops

I could not feed the fire considering it untouchable
My only way was through it

The only way to knowledge is through God I had to say
And what0000 is0 God000 she had to say

The void is the plate
Engraving zigzag
Fire the flare of sound through it
Voice ashen

Is this writing
Then where is my tongue
I’ve abandoned the pail and pitched my tent on seesaw water

What if I am my own witness
My ears believe each other