I

Faring
and with a full tank:
                              past death regardless
and into death pointless. Peopled, yes.
Some on the top. Some in the belly,
the belly night.
Past the murdering
elements diminishing
by fortuity and into the carnival
of intended gurry.
Some on the top night.
Some in the belly, racked
there as in the clay
niches of the actual and now
sepulchral warrens of the saints

There are dim red lamps along the steel labyrinths.
Incense pots empty for two thousand years.
And an empty rack where Howard, a ship’s fireman,
lately made photos of his hard cock
to send them home
to Marie:
             past death
and into death, peopled with a sense
of passing along. More of us or less,
how we measure the carelessness
of the waves.

II

In a small long boat
far at sea. Mast broken and the sun is cold.
And Etheridge at the prow
his jaw encased with ice.
And turning, are turned away by
premonitions daily:
a hacked joint hovers
in the air and we saw it. Pearly
gristle on and off in the fog
and a boot slopping with blood. And we turned away
from Foyroydar. We bore back
toward Hofn.
And there she came down
the hill on a long finger of ice
that reached through the emerald grass.
She slid down to us
on her belly
bringing fishes, bread, and a silver liquor.
She bade us take our knives and we did
and she told us we could and we ate
our own flesh. It came off
of our arms like a paste.
And no pain. And she clothed us.
And I got a pair of black pants,
a band of emerald green at the waist.