due to an unprecedented
rise in inflation, we’re
cutting back on imagery in poems
any sort of water is a no-go leading
as it does to fonts, producing
a whole curious seal 
as you tipped on a rock
like a skateboard, like a counterpoint
to its oil slick head
being in this big wicked wild thing
with seals and walking paths
and low labyrinths all above

a realization like that comes 
at a price that would
make you shudder, even wholesale

it would not behoove you
to read the words backwards,
attempting to materialize one snapdragon
sprung out a slate-speckled vase
or stung with hot light rain
wandering the presidio
talking of trucker tans

i am here to help you with
the poverty of images
the foyer of a party
when you’ve arrived too early
a door that bears water
and swells shut

it’s difficult to picture
nothing and
i am sympathetic
to that, i am

have you tried white 
space between lines
or you could picture 
nothing at all—it leads some
to clouds, fairly cheap as they 
lay so flush to the brim
in the bins of poets’ imagining

here, we would close by

broadening the scene
(this is completed with a
strategic 3rd party contract)
wildfl owers beaded through gras ! s
the un4giving morning, span
ked with sun or softer,
` an imal mid day sle ep c law f
ooted couch stuffed with ^hoars
ehair