Inside The Cloud That Scraped The Roof

over there far off tired from searching or
not searching—the great moments
are all over, boats pass beneath the bridge
fitted-out with red letters. read across
from left to right they spell
only a circular argument, turning
the reinvented wheel on a blind axis.
here, their unsatisfied selves
are a placebo to the notion of past-time
constantly spoken of—deep in something
like thought or happiness in the
absolute & everlasting—each time the hour
strikes, punching its way drunk
through fog the eyes never grow used to

 

 

Without Further Prospects

the message has been sent. branches
drooping heavily against a window
where the scratched white resembles
hair blanketing a winter vagina

first the right hand stuck out above
the underwater head. imagine
describing such a thing—a throat
behind a screen of its own noise

the clock hands swim under clear glass
one stroke at a time—regular as crystal
iodine or bone ash or ammonia. ritual
& sacrifice are nightly performed here

bare hips pressed to the wall—is any-
one listening? you do not know. a code
tapped-out on the steaming body
to be satisfied by as little as a word

in one corner a viennese piano lies in
wait with all of its keys removed. jaws
flex soundlessly in the dark. trust no-one.
the shoes are in the box beside the door

 

Copyright © Louis Armand, 2005.

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Louis Armand is an artist and writer who has lived and worked in Prague since 1994. He is currently director of Intercultural Studies at the Philosophy Faculty of Charles University, and Director of the Prague James Joyce Centre. He is editor of the cultural monthly PLR (Prague Literary Review), and his literary publications include Strange Attractors (Cambridge: Salt, 2003), and Inexorable Weather (Todmorden: Arc, 2001).