Dale Jensen

Gers

it as te

myo wnb lo od

o nth ef ing ger s

ofm ym in d

Signal

he but it sets the stage for contrasting portraits

i am an eyelid a gun a shot of whiskey come back

until we came to the crime scene tape

firing the cannon you keep track of them all

and then the bell rang

would be raised would be fired up

would be were healthy and fed on slippers

and windows of the shops

any fingerprints on that signal?

office was in the remaining lakes

prominent failures were a few from the water

you want to prowl if you want taller

fingerprint ate someone try again when it’s baggage

you could hear the windows from here whistling

Staying With That Now

loneliness is i told her

loneliness is the air between telephones

the one that had

the number you could reach

see you again i stayed with that name

a city so you could see it from the inside

a foggy drift of hearts they waited

with your eyes closed

then show you the golden apple

then pull it out of your blues song

i am things that once had each other

i was your you that’s you where

i am an address from a solitary sky

i am he didn’t say you remember

you remember spilled eyes that were the telephone

you are a reason floating four feet above the ground

everyone is watching with their astonished lives

lives once waiting in an ice cube

each of everyone you love

you remember don’t think

Eat That

that that eat you

that eat you that

that eat that you

eat you that eat you

say that that eat

you that that you

i accuse you you that

eat eat that eat

that that that that that

where can you find

that you

After the Train Snaps a Bad Decision

humiliation an impulse glory

a school thong thanking release

a strange to me

there is no reason to blame the stadium

he sits on his own lap at the edge of the bed

we get in the car

the evidence condemns

ask the judge the real world

and the unconvincing shrug

of a street corner

the phone bawled out its rigging

the ship set its sails to a sunset

you don’t remember innocent people

or the conversations their footprints had behind them

at night their shadows all remember you

the entrails of your own operation

that dead wall already

age brings bunnies

bunnies have handlebars

they chew steel like carrots

the self-humiliation of that

an impulse glory

Dale Jensen was born in Oakland and has degrees in psychology from UC Berkeley and the University of Toronto. He has seven books and five chapbooks out and in the 1980’s edited the poetry magazine Malthus. He tries to keep ahead of himsel