6 poems by Michael Begnal

A Press of the (O) Mind

1.

Phones dropped
in the damp night of leaves
a drizzly night

picking them up
then the signals dropped
and trying to pick it up
but that eventually they had
numerous pictures of
themselves online

and texted some lines
sad to themselves

2.

what system underpins?
  nature worship,
      how worship?
if worship,
in strange moments of thought
a scraped calf,
dying in the grass
sun blurs the way
down the road,
spiderette
   on the windshield

(what system decries,
should there be decrying)

3.

of bodies in the bed
in morning sensations
sorta asleep
haff missed each other
like a ballpoint pen ripples
a fleshy leaf

4.

he was surrealist and obscure
paratactic
in fact his argument, though sometimes
pitched at people

and if a press
had not recovered him

is all it takes,
a press of
the (o) mind

it is a great thing
having a book of poems out

5.

awash, the run of the waterfalls
rushes toward you
like it’s enclosed
in glass
and coming oakish
down the tracks

Inter-Nights

Train horns
a man blowing a horn
  bridges
scaffolds
apartment buildings,
apartments with lamps
and shades

a warm May night
before the ugly summer,

inter-nights
  of the window open,
  a felt breeze
  moves on my arm
  the little hairs,

in one of them,
   with hairs

•

a restaurant
on the other side of the street
on the hill of the hilly city,
a side street,
a white plastered wall
                    facing and warm,

a hill, a slope,
a Saturday night,

as it
          should
                        be