I.



The Alps are crumbling.

I heard it on the radio

the 3AM radio, which is a different thing an altogether different thing

the 3AM radio happens when you're careening lost on a lonesome highway

(if you blur your eyes the arcs of smoke and twinkling lights from the oil refinery

look like a friendly glowing ewok village in the night

except for that acrid smell of the machinery)

driving on some strange stretch of empty road: detour: because they closed the I-25, the entire thing

miles and miles of dead space

(how can you close an entire interstate?

they might as well turn off the generators

take down the telephone lines, stop the satellites from streaming)

and anyway

the 3 AM voice of america said

The Alps are crumbling.

By 2020 they will be rubble.

Permafrost, impermanent, melted

by the global warming the UN has just declared Real

the Alps.  mountains of stability.  crumbling.

you too can move mountains, without even trying.

It's one thing to know you can blow through the side of a mountain

to make space for your cars and trains and people

another thing to take a mountain apart by accident

by the mere fact of your being.



II.



spliced / they claim our genes as that which makes us human / and then go on to splice 

them

(and how exactly does one go about splicing a gene?) / recombined / transgenic 

unknowns

divided / these words into ones and zeros

broken / chemical bonds /  rearranged / can nature break them down at all?

broken mandala of multicolored light a spectrum

broken the egg the needle the sperm the glass

broken / the symptom /  the body part / the diagnosis / the cure

broken / schitzo / phrenic / i think the sensitives cannot handle all this

can they really weave the mind together by breaking it into neurotransmitters 

(synthesized from broken chemicals

tested on the creatures they tore apart?)

and finally, finally

broken / that which all matter is made of /                         split 

and you know when matter splits the broken bits (that which we call radiation)

the broken bits find that which is whole and begin to break it too

did they know that the brokenness was contagious

that it makes living tissues decay?



broken how we see the totality of it all:

no connection / famine and poverty ? agribusiness lobbying for export subsidies ? your strawberries in the middle of winter

no connection / crumbling mountains and disappearing songbirds ? unratified kyoto protocol ? leaving the porch light on



it is systemic.



III.



you could spend your life asking how could they do this except

There is no they there.

i look at my hands spread open wide

did I do this?  because i wanted a hot shower and a peach in the middle of winter?

i claw to the core of my being looking for the antiseed 

but i think : i did not want this and neither did you

and you can't make an effigy of a man in a suit and say, he did it

parade around with that puppet like the puppet is really the enemy

(although i probably would take out rumsfeld if i had the chance (doesn't he just look

like he's possessed by a demon whenever he speaks and i was always wary of that pyramid on the dollar bill but))

                                                             Let me tell you about the time i crossed the ocean

a grand splendid ship she was a ship for a princess with marble spiraling staircases

fruit sculptures, plush carpets, ringing laughter

i would sit in a dark corner in a play for inconspicuous 

always some filipino steward would emerge from the rich woodwork

lighting my clove cigarette before i even brought it to my lips...

and i would dine in a twinkling dining room on cream puffs and champagne sorbet 

in my $4 thrift store evening gown.  the charming romanian waiters would sit me with the captains of industry 

and so i would hear their talk and drink their expensive french wine and listen

how much they charge now for health care for our employees and

which ships have you traveled on this year and 

how is your daughter at harvard and your offices in geneva and 

your winter home in mallorca and



they were not they.  



they might have commanded thousands of the working class

and owned millions of dollars but

they didn't want this. 

and they loved me because somewhere they knew what a broken mess it was 

i made them hope because i was young

and they loved me because i would dance with them sweeping across that ballroom

and that was all they wanted really; we all want to dance.

"i am in the midst of a dying civilization in the midst of a dark wide sea"



IV.





Jenny is sitting cross-legged in a sunny meadow

as she speaks she fiddles with little twigs

splices blades of grass pulls apart flower petals

but I don't want to say "why are you tearing apart that flower

you're not even saying he loves me not"

because she doesn't even realize that she's pulling apart the flower

and then Jenny would feel bad and it would be embarrassing and awkward

but I get more agitated with every petal and then I have to interrupt her

Jenny why are you pulling apart the daisy

and she looks at the white petals on the grass open wide

I don't know