Vultures

If my screen is a lake
then I have nothing but faith
to assure me that life unwritten swims
beneath the white, shining barrier
safe from the eyes that circle overhead

I believe there will be a deep shrieking sound
some two levels down
of a bright metallic idea tearing at it-
self and
furiously eating itself
alive to the faint hum of an underwater waltz
set on repeat long ago and long abandoned by the original listener
I have not heard it myself, nor have I seen
the Great Eel that passes over warring sparks, flickering carnage
of overwrought poetry
      twist once his shimmering scales
            one thousand truths sent wrecklessly into the dark

Five levels down, I sense
the classrooms of the insufferable sea teachers
who taught me to arrange the pieces and ends of my childhood memories
spelling impossible words in alphabet soup
I never drank
Innocence, Refund, these words that miss
our fort’s pink ribbon, the chest of jewels
the forgotten voice of our babysitter, she speaks
what words?  No, which.  Which words did she speak?
She taught me once so well
I could sing it all by myself

At the bottom of the machine
nineteen levels down, or so I believe
are the original hands
Their life’s work traced in awe of the burning ceiling light
Not these hands, surely, no trace left
these, so fast, hunched like birds of prey
pecking apart the sunlight’s dance on water
while down below the original left scribbles the seminal waltz
across the walls, the floor
in that lovely dark age before the dawning of SEX
tattooed into the laminate wood desk
countless fathoms below these, vultures, bristling
who dive at the dawning of death

They swear to you now that they once saw the original right hand–
Face the flag
pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America
and not to the bones below our school
where the dissolved people of the original land
ask us would we kindly not step on their sacred–
Eyes up, face front
Not yet pledged to the blank white screen, thank God
right hand where they told me my heart was
splayed silently against its surface, believing
Eternal life of the water bug