his feet are bare and open
herringbones of pentecostal bracken
like two birds frozen in the nest;

a nametag is lashed upon his breast,
   wilderness homely and pure,
his praline token unsung
as he works it like a moat
        churning honey pinwheels
that hibernate between inlets
in the heads of children.

names turn their faces, like the shaken joy
of turtle dove couplets.
   only subsidiary bodies-
pebbles shamed into the grey-belly well
like beasts with bloody noses
can keep from sinking

from his geometry of words,
steely discuses oxidizing on the tongue
in nematic anchors.

like the tree that snaps the boulder,   schisms
   diluted and starry-eyed
by the river's throaty sheen-
the tension has a fissure, a wall of brick he must devein.

the mountains clap against the soles
of an evening gleaned from taxonomy

      tinged letters, the tips budding spinal chords

like the serrated backs of alligators crooning in the bay.

but his feet
are furnaces, aztec flowers curling
               around
until he can cradle the wound without silence.