New Intelligence Poem by Rae Armantrout

1

Stars
are the campfires
of exiles.

Language exists
to pull things
close.


*

Stop that!

Communications
are being monitored.

Collusion is forbidden.

Humanity
will be punished

with the profusion
of new jargons.


2

Inverted in glass,
a white cup
invents the underworld.

*

Fog thins
to chiffon,

nylon,

Easter.


*

In the universe next door,
I'm gone

and the shadows
of the leaves

of the elm I had pulled down

still make a fuss
over the earth.