Tim Rogers

     Surface of the Self as a Lintel Made of Wood

                I.
Sacred and damned a cross
of purposes the self can't always complete
three 
is not the purest of perfections
Circles round & autumn 
apples 
vaguely gravid
admit
Adam & St. Andrew
Swiss bowmen
suffering
this tree of nourishments

Make a play of planes & gifts /
of revolutions
and
of fists /
                      & fish
(both infinitely singular 
or of the common 
plural)

Think of this as Sunday school

A present edifice
   where rests

                the wind


                II.
Failure too
is a revelation
(the prophet troubled / a man
Oh, man

The blues sure do
Make the time go / by

An incessant ticking of the clock
& chopsticks
this is the unanticipated antecedent 
to lips
pursed and pouting
ripening
red
the dwindling season

Wild strawberries can still be found
perfuming 
the verges
Small but not
                insignificant

                           Look

                   lovingly

at the trees
time does not wait for fire
for flames

Those limbs
they sway
             / they sway

Whether heavy or of all
free

Tim Rogers is an American poet living in Czechia, Europe. He graduated from Brooklyn College many years ago with an MFA, having studied under the tutelage of Allen Ginsberg. Today he runs an English-language bookstore and sits on the board of a non-profit that is primarily involved with teaching English to school-age children and as an English-language resource and community center.
 
 
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