Cocktail Aquarium

Coins & gems in a glass casket

a small ocean ovaled by its own inside

winds & galactic weather

it's Dali time

swooning over artful rocks

transparencies planes

meandering stairs

the wall-eyed tenants in a wise stupor

thread their sunken condos

keeping their open house for gawkers

on dunce stools

flow is... time is your other

unctuous element

-after the chase-spent hours

miming grows moody

you stand in a sad indefinite

twilight of coma...

(then a flurry of japanese teabreak:

the spectral bodies sway as a party

brooding under their coifs

of fin-fans)

(when a nervous twitch

startles the daze of a crystal mermaid

the rosary

under her tail

floats off in code...)

bulking over the bar

we drink & drink again

pondering when your exoph-

thalmic eye will admit

a pain or sleep

or the suck of death

& its levitation

meanwhile the weight of water

pinches a permanent

mute on the noise

of your existence-only the put-

put of the air pearls

we pump down & you spit back

with delicate disdain

affirms this

rational eden of sizes & orders

one form clearing the next

by an arrowy twist-

hooked watchers

in reverse hypnosis we yawn

weep guffaw

two worlds exchanging

stares not knowing whose is

the more dream

restive enchanted

unease & each in its aura

on guard