Dancing with a candlestick tonight
O Seraph, you came here in my afterlean haze—six-winged and many-
eyed—a minister, a flame of fire—you freed me for a moment from the scut-
tle of ratfoot, from the silver windowglint of the dead bay, from the car chassis
which scorched my friend into dust, from the Ward’s fluorescence—
that flat gray now glowing orange from your candle-voice in my cell;
and the static rush which hasn’t left my head since I came to
this Miami, this Babylon; Her melty aftersnow still sweet in my nose,
and Her syrupy spit still coating my clothes, and Her sandy skin draining
my soles, and my path across Her ending in a Burning Bush—a false Sinai—
crystal Mount of steel and glass;
O Seraph, I haven’t seen you since that Minsk winter, when I mistook
your wick-black eyes for the faint ember sun and saw your wings making
cyrillic quillmarks across the brutal gray; and I beg you, drag my
weak paper-robed arms back to that time—before the doctor comes,
before I need to take my pills, before I need to go to sleep in this sterile cot—
sing for me, dance with me.
Nuclear Semiotics
So inhospitable. You are
Scorchèd. Pliant seed of alter mundus
Flaming the lung. Find a gasmask
Or grasp another. Listen to the squeal
Of tendoncords. Blind bard, pluck
Coarse twine. Ancient bluecrowned ridge
A tumored shoulder. Your pups in the night
Buggèd with nails. To bomb away or make
Menacing earthworks. Up to you hun
To chopstick the baby spine. Spike
The gruel as ground unturned. Horsebreaker;
Your dadskull blasted. Face a Lykian
Rune shattered. Slobbered adrenochrome
Lest you see a hand. Run
Spikes across the grid. Rake me
Along your future. Earthen tongue
— Sam Yaziji is a writer from Miami, Florida. He works as the print production editor for Poetry International. His poems have been published or are forthcoming in Zone 3 Press, Solum, and the Passage Prize Vol. 1. His research interests include Eastern Christian hymnography and cybernetics. His website is samyaziji.weebly.com and his Instagram is @samyaziji.