In Harmony

1

I speak to harmonicas, the angel inside

seizuring toward some hell. My body can’t handle

its breath all wailmouth, all vent and scream.

Men who play their spit against

its copper hum yearn to close wounds

whistling from their fingertips.

Archangels crack against air like beetle carcasses.

She used to say slaves’ voices tumbled

from the whine. Her mythology’s logic

seems sound—even

trees were seen leaning in

as though hearing someone familiar.

Maybe harmonica is neck creak

stretched into confession, a drinking gourd

spilling its constant stream of bones.

The pines’ green is shadow soft

and sings like a hinge, like a choir

of harmonicas soldered to an uncle’s teeth.

Why question if he’s ever

seen ghosts? They’re right

at the tip of his tongue.

2

At the tip of his tongue, a slit spills white noise

at a frequency too low to dance to. But there is a boogie

man in the ball sack. Kneeling

is the position that runs off demons.

I’ve known God to rise

like a white rabbit from the hat-

less head of a man who never knew God

would answer to my mouth’s pleading spin.

I teach religion like Babel: down, with a humility

throat-knotted and blind as dust.

3

I was sure he would taste like pianissimo

thrashed by a saxophone’s impatient treble.

I was sure his whispers were Tongue clicking

his Holy Ghost a million lip trills per second.

He’d whisper something foul to set the mood,

to push his stutter-mouth into mine

so that I may, for him, speak his confessions:

there is not a man inside this fort of sandstone and silt

I’ve kissed a man into an abomination most profound

If I spit into the toilet what’s left,

will the foggy water become a crystal ball’s

clarifying glass, spiraling what’s next before the next flush?

I’m tired of ghosts and their ephemeral whines.

I send their voices down one wave at a time.