H I G H W A T E R M A R K S A L O [ O ] N
         
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______ copies @ $16 each VOLUME 2 Number 1 | Beat Keerl, Matthew Klane & Doug Rogers 

L A U R A   E. J.   M O R A N   www.lauraejmoran.com
Laura E. J. Moran performs internationally on the Spoken Word circuit. She was 1992 Jean Garrigue Award recipient and the 1996 Grand Slam Champion in Seattle. She links local poets with national Spoken Word Artists as the curator of the First Fridays: A contemporary Poets Series in Narrows burg. Her poems are published in Defined Providence, Revival: Spoken Word for Lollapalooza and Children Remember Their Fathers. Her collections Original Skin and Live Bait demonstrate her power onthe page and the stage. She is owner and proprietor of Photosynthesis Press, a letter press. Moran received an NYFA grant for Emerging Writers at the Center for Book Arts in New York City.

 

 
from  H i G H   W A T E R M A R K   S A L O [O] N  volume 1 number 1

O'Keefe to Steglitz

Love can crush. Why sip, why brush
your lips to a further vista-- all eye, not tongue
not print, not bruise, not come enough to hear
my wet breath petition sweat from your carotid.

Blood wags its tail cannot stop.
Despite your vehement stamp,
point to the corner all you want,
still, hearts opt for the sleeve.

A brave priest in a brothel
pitches faith with old flowers
drooping on little tables.
This is not about faith.

Wine bottles tumble as we stutter
out and down some new dark
tunnel where language haunts
neon spells, jumbled and vestigial.

No matter. All ends. In heaven,
we have no tongues, no salt, no plum,
no cinnamon, no hunger.
Now: consider my neck tender.

Space they say-- when the airlock snaps
and astronauts gasp-- smells of lemons
and burnt tangerines like you love
just before time tilts and we spill

heavenly towards each other,
rush perfectly home beyond skin
within it, between space and of it. Let love crush.
We wolf down the animal lust left in us.