Mark Kaplon Poetry Quotes

“Busy in the business of day—
my storming blood
has just met
a pair of eyes
rainswept sand….

That face, again, that face like sunken sand—
the sand, sunken, of a face that ancient….

More worn than my face unborn—
contours I have known
in the bones of her cheeks
a recognition—
a pair of orphans
unmasked at morn….

Because only, only a girl borne of remembering
could wear that countenance of mourning….

Across the wash pale soft of dawn
float close weighty blossoms

on thresholds unknown—

for the fragile, delicate tenderness
of her composure
just-holding, achingly,
on the edge of things….

A world of raindrops floating in her eyes—
in her eyes sand grains softly settle….

Although to one another we are
only a presence in the room

and all's silence between us—

still, hers is a presence I’ve known:
of age more somehow
than the day I was born
a relation there remains
nose kissed to nose….


Slaving in the sweat of the sun
I’m back at it in the beds—

as, over all the grounds,

waxing with the sun
personalities of sheds,
tines, the animals,
define themselves….

Heading now to the meal hall
to eat and talk, after digging—

when my momentum stalled:
by hedges of the wall's
the visage of her
in the sunny landscape
a teardrop of midnight….

Tearing's the flesh of my heart
on my cheeks in tears—

for her fragile chin
and the wrinkles of
her eyes when she smiles
so glassy I could cry….

Commotion of knives and forks—
today the commons are aloud

with cups and conversation:

a wisp here, a leap
of voices there
the day’s news bounces
its way through the crowd….

Splashing up a laughter of glasses
the guys devour their stories

about girls at the party—

and when we eat our fill
glad in our stomachs
there’s lots of chin in it
we raise each other’s grins

sitting in satisfaction
and stimulating to the sun….

Tense in the laughter
of friends and companions—

lines of my age un-wrinkle:

by portals of the door
her expression there's
more sober than smiling:
for guile am I un-abled….

Not the friction of sticks, no, nor
some feverish itch that must

until exhaustion consume—

but a long blue flame, slow
and fluidly moving
will our relation be:
a translucent vein

loose in the midnight river….

Now— into the doings of day:
but to approach her

my eyes can't meet
my walkingʻs fallen
dead at the knees
and thoughts of my head

now drown in blood—
blackness and oblivion...”
― Mark Kaplon, Song of Rainswept Sand

“Chatting to the gossip of flames
waking from the slumber of

our flesh-drunk night together—

it’s only when I step out
to pee do I notice—
how far, burgundy-dark,
the moon has risen….

On four paws the shepherd-
dogs bound, lightly

though the trees they

hardly touch on earth—
we saw it from far
sunk here
in an always-ache….

Dyeing paling twilight woods—
a pair of wasps, spiraling, writhe….

Wetted lips of hers
and mine, just-parted,

move over each other

with tongues just-coming
but refuse—
like mists of evening
they've no place to settle….

Just-here though she's singing
she’s in some song from long ago—

poised on the brink
of twilight longing
three thousand miles
rush through my heart….

Under undulating curtains—

I hover above her
the tips of me brushing
the tips of her—
breathing back and forth
a column of air

we share our breath
slowly asphyxiating….

From burning wood campfire sparks dart off
extinguishing in the wet blue dark…

how you blow your long wind
across my embers,
through my soul, she pleads me,
take away the pain—

I dip a branch in blue water
and plunge it into coals….

***

In pre-dawn dark, against
a leaping inferno of flames

black monolith of wood
in the cast iron compartment
softens, and—gradually— fractures
to cells, warping upward,

until from the top a shard splinters:
pearls of flame string a fiber
and leap in little tongues
while the log, glowing, engulfed,

is consumed by the inferno contained….

A shadow daunts me, haunts and taunts me
now reaching far, now recoiling, now growing bold….

I once sang eruptions and the wind—

then appeared you
it took my whole life
singing only the songs of you
and still I sing for you

what other refuge
can stay me from this torment?

So— my doppelganger has arrived
no one said it would happen this way

but the way his hands
fold like mine, the style
of his humor, broadness of his smile—
even the way he walks….

Licking and lapping these lashings
of grasses are in tongues at my feet

smoldering's the fury within me—

I have seen my fields of daylight warp
to noxious-air infernos
but still to the clean blue of the flame
I take rest in her breast….

His songs I mouth, and in my head
is his voice— I cannot hear my own….

in my mind I see myself— thin,
stupid— my arms too weak,
my own chest too frail— and besides
I prefer him more….

Along spiral lines, seed-heads decay— swept away
they whirl and writhe in the hot blue fire of evening….

Stuck in a mural of sticky flesh— the family…
I am locked-in-arms with brothers

and sisters, drooping at the thighs
with nieces and nephews,
grafted to parents at the scalp, and
pasted with toddlers all over…

hived, sapped, black I sit, subject
to the flavors and aromas of your abuse….

Then— be wrapped in his presence…

crescendo to his warmth
the cascade of your laughter
search in his wrinkles
for the boy inside him…

I’m just biding here, bragless,
trying to admit these
rival-streams that flow
in one latticework of blood….

Halves of flesh and bosomy hips, lips
like dark ripe fruits they're chasing—

I chased them…

full-feathered was their hair
like floss in the sunshine
fine-fingered was their style
like laces cut to curves:

and then there was you,
returning one, just there
like the midnight moon
in my sky at noontime….”
― Mark Kaplon

“Beginning at dawn— with faint pink streaks
across the sky— may the days be long….

Bright-white and blazing, breaking
waves gild the sea at sunrise:

from our bed on the bedrock
I rise up singing:
this the song of confidence—
I am a husband….

Boys and girls splash at the sun
all-dazzling on the water

to catch the sun and clutch it—

and flowers oftentimes possess
a floating transparency

you can see but cannot touch...

tempered by cliffs
and the inhumanness of rock
I’ll stay, she promises,
to watch your flower set

beyond and go out, shining,
of my own horizon….

A pair of butterflies in sunlight
leap in breezy flutters of flight

high above the seed-heads:

sun-bright morning
she heralds the people
with fountains of melody
gurgling from her voice

in youth gathering siblings
and elders together

—to fly away with tears….

Grappling in the sweat of the ring
you fall down on the net—

a white-light kind of dying…

to be on the bottom
in a world full of others
and to choose it for my place:
until your window-frame be

palace-clouds and glassy:
I’ll wear the ring….

Then, when all was silence between us
and we were to one another

only a presence in the room—

still I knew she was my wife:
for I could recognize
a relation there
of age more than just
the day I was born...

and now here we are standing
a pair meeting face to face….”
― Mark Kaplon, Song of Rainswept Sand

“Hand in hand, my love, come away
with me into the blackness—

by the trunk of an old strong oak:

I long to hold you
all through the night
and, knowing not of dawn,
to not talk once—
a pair of hands
nightswept-earth….


Dawning starlight above
splinters the sky to nerves—

now's time for leaving:

poised on the verge
of shorelines burgeoning
everything inside is
raw and tingling….

Over the mountain in utter aloneness
winds are blowing in a cold void….

Just a few promises I’d packed
when I made my way east

like a cloud torn from moorings

always there've been those of us
who sought their origins
on the road
— under an empty moon—
and the origins of origins….

In electrical well-spring vision

nuzzled in the bosom of hills
on the roaming magnetic earth—

far away though they are
the cloud-river
of stars configures
over and over
these visions of you….

Shaking off its dust—
that glittering icy swirl abides….

On the roaming magnetic earth
lying flat, my eyes shocked awake

by the electric liquid light:

chilling winds do not chill me
I know no harm can hold me
even a killing wound will only
seep me back into the stars...

be seeping out from me:

in the float of her womb
and cradled from the cold—
that cradle-of-stars hanging
the milky way….

Over the bay just-beginning—a cusp and
crescent sliver—by the constellations paling fading….

Transient as I am
from before and into after—

like blue vapor, breath travels
in a light from long ago…

here though I knew she'd be
to be here with her
in scorn of all happenstance
is more than a choice:

a joy that's almost loss—
lightning and paralysis….

The blue fire of delight flickers
through sockets of her skull—

so all the world knows not

or pretends not to know:
a person takes a lifetime
to get to know
but the thrill of remembrance
when our eyes met

was just one instant:
it happens all the time….”
― Mark Kaplon, Song of Rainswept Sand