poems by nicholas alti

Residual Wisdom

It’s supposed to feel non-possible here
twin prisms of coiling realism strike
to conjure an image first

We mustn’t leave each other
as excerpts
as poorly rendered particles

We break well unlike god and unlike god
are simple in wanting

Pragmatism is candlewax, better dripped
on inner thighs or clavicles

A formal invite to proxy war
wear something see through, voluminous

Us come from unpopulated planets
half-assed solarium
made not with you in mind

Me speak for me alone
me float when conjured

We can hum ideas, unnecessary ideas
about storms beyond ourselves

You can hold your breath and help
build pressure

Well, let’s start by treating vice
in theory, cosmologically, as innocuous

I prefer my afternoon hooch unfancied
and proclivity for doom medicated

My personal meridian is upended

motivated by peaceful carnality

Is it when you are excited or sleepy
you ought to shove down the tongue

in avoidance of severance?

While family matters make family matter
ammonia and bleach make mustard gas

Elucidate, to me, is a term to buy time
in the head before the body relapses

Strange worries . . . I can’t decipher multiplicity
from synesthesia
I’m discovering every cent and iota I owe

My greatest fear has probably already occurred
I’m just worried about the consequences

If seeing is believing? Seek professional help
If I could be but one thing?

Essential and transient, obnoxiously phosphorescent

Whatever emanation it is that simply overgrows
a home, starts at the foundation

and spreads through the bones

Denver Quarterly, 57.3