Aditi Machado
from “now,”
THE RED ROAD heads into a red mountain
you listen to its snow melt at the horizon
red asphalt picks up the pink of olden reeds
you listen to dried-up pipelines
red dust stepping up to audition
in full-screen mode, the snow-tipped yarrow
censors your aesthetic, you cathect
a windmill in dry superabundance
cozying up to the cactus syndicate
you audit sonic fashions
you & your echinopsis bloom sillily
at this kinked-up altar of vocables
in this way lacerated
in this way salvific
the sounds of the desert tether you
to rusty pipelines shot thru
w/ hazard, heckling your sad little
human performance
*
A RELATION DEVELOPS between the wind &
you that’s lichenous, you who art green
to love, abstruse movements
brushing your burrs & birds, sine
qua non
sometimes it is a burden
to be so regardful, so cultishly
advertent of kingdoms that prosper
while you, o specious you, you putter
in your vehicular language
you suppress your vatic impulse
namely, you stand with your legs apart
namely, the small tongue gets angry
namely, you odden into being
& an ill wind grates on
your chinny chin chin
THE RED ROAD heads into a red mountain
you listen to its snow melt at the horizon
red asphalt picks up the pink of olden reeds
you listen to dried-up pipelines
red dust stepping up to audition
in full-screen mode, the snow-tipped yarrow
censors your aesthetic, you cathect
a windmill in dry superabundance
cozying up to the cactus syndicate
you audit sonic fashions
you & your echinopsis bloom sillily
at this kinked-up altar of vocables
in this way lacerated
in this way salvific
the sounds of the desert tether you
to rusty pipelines shot thru
w/ hazard, heckling your sad little
human performance
*
A RELATION DEVELOPS between the wind &
you that’s lichenous, you who art green
to love, abstruse movements
brushing your burrs & birds, sine
qua non
sometimes it is a burden
to be so regardful, so cultishly
advertent of kingdoms that prosper
while you, o specious you, you putter
in your vehicular language
you suppress your vatic impulse
namely, you stand with your legs apart
namely, the small tongue gets angry
namely, you odden into being
& an ill wind grates on
your chinny chin chin
Aditi Machado is the author of two books of poetry from Nightboat, Emporium (2020) and Some Beheadings (2017), and seven chapbooks, most recently now (Sputnik & Fizzle, 2022) and The End (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2020).