Divine Astronomy

Daniel Danger

Orion

Far back when I went zig-zagging

through tamarack pastures

you were my genius, you

my cast-iron Viking, my helmed

lion-heart king in prison.

Years later now you're young

my fierce half-brother, staring

down from that simplified west

your breast open, your belt dragged down

by an oldfashioned thing, a sword

the last bravado you won't give over

though it weighs you down as you stride

and the stars in it are dim

and maybe have stopped burning.

But you burn, and I know it;

as I throw back my head to take you in

an old transfusion happens again:

divine astronomy is nothing to it.

Indoors I bruise and blunder,

break faith, leave ill enough

alone, a dead child born in the dark.

Night cracks up over the chimney,

pieces of time, frozen geodes

come showering down in the grate.

A man reaches behind my eyes

and finds them empty

a woman's head turns away

from my head in the mirror

children are dying my death

and eating crumbs of my life.

Pity is not your forte.

Calmly you ache up there

pinned aloft in your crow's nest,

my speechless pirate!

You take it all for granted

and when I look you back

it's with a starlike eye

shooting its cold and egotistical spear

where it can do least damage.

Breathe deep! No hurt, no pardon

out here in the cold with you

you with your back to the wall.

--Adrienne Rich

mannequin

I think my favorite part of Lit Crawl - SF last night was finding this amazing mannequin at an antiques/second-hand store on Valencia street.

The store owner (I regretfully did not catch the name of the shop) said she's from the 30s. They don't make mannequin faces like this any more:

Her realistic glass eyes and unique, rather prominent nose make her look spookily alive, even as chipped and old as she is. I love her placid expression, as if she were politely listening to some painfully boring fellow at a dinner party. She is of course too well bred to show any exasperation.

I've always found mannequins to be thrillingly creepy and I think some credit must be given to an old Twilight Zone episode called "The After Hours" I watched in rerun as a kid. I've remembered vague bits and pieces of it all these years after seeing it that one time. I just searched on YouTube and found it: