As Easy As

by John W. Sexton

white black mood …
invisible spectral snows
forever freezing him in

the shapeless house …
I am squeezed through an udder
into the basement

older than the noises
of space … loud
that very first silence

an engine of starlings
… the exhaled breath
takes us higher

trouble in the brittle sky
… brought before
the commissar of toffee

father snail’s spiral home
he screwed himself in
he screwed himself out

the ladder of spaces
but no rungs … Xu Lizhi
steps into faith

as easy as
pulling the stars
with a pliers