PAUL CUNNINGHAM
from KNOT A TRAIN
this whale is no
not, is no physical record
this whale is
down the quarterdeck
this whale is
train cars and cataracts
this whale is
tunnel vision
this whale is
the generation of sound
this whale is knot
chapter is caput is ears
this whale is in the event
of an accident
this whale is wheel-axle-
frame assembly
this whale is
waxing spermaceti
this whale is a toothed
rack of couplets
this whale is a real
knuckle-coupler
this whale is a hell
of a central scaffold
this whale is
locked cars and blue flags
this whale is
for crossbuck fags
this whale is for
new mouths
this whale is
in the hole
this whale is the rolling
stack, the battleship
this whale is my
clown wagon
this whale is every-
thing that ebbs
one cargo container
on top of another
this whale
is the term
for the only kind
of engine
––––
knobbed spire
my long-sleeve mind
layers of Gothic cream
slimed this body anew
whiskey and
the loss of whiskey
the loss of my
whale’s poem
and a soft corresponding
rib, blood-bubbling
spout-hole
I dance on the shore
in rough weather
with my storm-gaze
my gyroscope
expresses circularity
my iris, my white
arc pearl like snow
spin-cycle
gamble-storm
erasure, a pair
of dice
––––
with new poets come new poetry
this heave and toss business
but I feel as though
I’m sinking
all zig
zag
in a cistern
of toxic honey
ocean of occasion
of great, great trouble
against the
laws
I seem to be
(always)
ancient tree hollowed
of substance
knotted to a future
I am untattooed, no map
no jolly boat
to carry me
out to
sea
––––
Paul Cunningham co-manages Action Books, an international press for poetry and translation. He is the author of Fall Garment (Schism Press, 2022) and The House of the Tree of Sores (Schism Press, 2020). From the Swedish, he is the translator of Helena Österlund’s Words (OOMPH! Press, 2019). He has also translated two chapbooks by Sara Tuss Efrik: Automanias: Selected Poems (Goodmorning Menagerie, 2016) and The Night’s Belly (Toad Press, 2016). His most recent poetry chapbook is The Inmost (Carrion Bloom Books, 2020). His interests include literary translation in theory and practice, decadent poetics, and ecocritical studies.