HOW IT WAS BROKEN FOR ITS PORTRAIT AMONG THE SLICKS

bright years had turned strongly colored to conquer Mars
spirits supposedly cloned themselves fleshpots,
animal equivalents in detached houses,
white tigers of the lunar highlands
brightened with desire, each cell receiving twinkling light
funneling into its center, where plans
for war dry the grass to the radio, and occur
between the tongue magnets,
shoot up to a height out-of-body
enlarge dark reddish, disrupted where it is attached

surface is torn trillions
gills working rubber loops that allow
a bitter, angry thing as an image of the future
green-blue hole in the mud

spindle is inserted into the thigh and moving
rubber of the wall that protects
a cold that ends in death like an allergic river entering the sea