POEMS
By Patrick Hurley ***there is no port of entry
what atlas charts these
saturnine territories?ingress is a dangerous fiction
radioactive particles
are ubiquitoustoxic energies fix our hopes
but only choice computes  ***these voices are not french
and this is no paradisetry for a somber tone but
mandatory laugh tracks
will make mockuneasiness like incessant
drumming on the hollow
reeds of deconstructionexperience shears off
limbs at oblique anglesthere is something in the east
but its name is unpronounceable  ***gross appetites do not always mislead
learn each name only to forget itsounds strike from odd angles
reminding the incredulous that
life might be after all one
long allergic reaction  ***dark coincidence under overcast skies
metaphysics and meteorology will collideutter meaningless enjoys unspeakable density  ***malevolent gestures dissipate as
reason lurches towards
its final resting placethe once nourishing loaves of
conventional wisdom are
ergot-laden slices of
spasmodic madnessvoices raised in prayer
spark now in the
animal heart only terror
authorPatrick Hurley was born in an unimportant midwestern American city in 1969. After wasting several years in graduate school, he published a book on Thomas Pynchon and taught writing and literature at a few colleges in Saint Louis, Missouri. He is now a full-time bartender and poet, currently obsessed with a long poetry collection in progress called Walking. He lives and works in Saint Louis.