SurVision Magazine
An international online magazine
that publishes Surrealist poetry in English.
Issue Eleven
DAN RAPHAEL
Excognito
everybody knew who I was but few agreed with each other
were the shadows or my features moving, was my height fluctuating
or had the sidewalk become a breathing trampoline
no one thought I was speaking their language
daylight melted like a pile of snow teleported to July
night-water was rising through my heels, not yet enough
to wash my face, to write on the dry pavement.
when I said I was hungry it sounded like
"get the fuck out of my way" which caused a few to bolt
some clutched whatever protection was under their shirt
a city bus pulled up, the driver came out and handed me the keys
as I got inside the bus became a bicycle with squirrels for pedals
in the mirror I saw the leaves of my hair were beginning to change colors.
where my watch was was a lens that could also receive
transmitting gps confusion so no one would know where I was
even if I refused to move
but soon I was heading the other way
turning onto wider and wider roads bordered by denser and denser forests.
the median became a canyon filled with ziggurats of shipping containers
glowing with light, exhaling so many origins and fuels
throwing ropes of water up to the surface that always slid back
up here the road don't mind slicing under mountains
as the light of stars is mostly waste disposal
so many pictures ahead and above
at least one of them is me
Circular Listening
a leopard opera, sung by a bassoon
clear red, not blood red
too dry to breathe, too bright to disrobe
looking inside the doorknob and out
a sound only white people make
not a guardian angel but a tiny moon over my shoulder
that gear between 4th and 5th
always more limbs than eyes
to suffer from moral dyslexia, only speaking in dictionary quotes
house flipped in its own foundation
soon the overdue will evaporate
seven layers a week
a hand sandwich, a burro burrito
even naked I'm too warm for the edge I need
driven or derived, syn the sized
why are those apples hovering above the street
wearing my clothes inside out, including the feathers
silver doesn't have to be threatened to shine
sip – it's very hot and expansive
impending darkness raises the hairs on the back of my
bedsheet, gravity, aluminium foil, & wariness combined
dancing above the ceiling, wooden flute in the wind
Waking Fog
When i wake this thin, dissipate, almost one with the fog
that almost affirms me, that i cohere, if thin as a hair
with hundreds of wires and pipes running through it
a beam of light containing a library
My muscles thicken first
protecting my re-firming bones
parts click together, blankets & windshield
skin & clothes pretend to be
face's architecture sketched in in seconds
When the hands start to do
when mouth and teeth start the dissembly line
legs reacting to whim or preprogramming
not a place to fly or swim, staying solid enough
to keep to the surface, minimal friction & refraction
Like two airborne moblets of pigeons helixing through each other
what's being exchanged, what spontaneous magnetism
data-rich detritus, airy solids evaporate in micro-nados,
flames barely a hundred molecules across
my only memory what my uncorrected eye smelled
Dan Raphael is from Portland,
Oregon. Recent work appears in Phantom
Drift, Lamplit Underground, synchronized chaos, Ginosko, SurVision,
and eratio. His poetry
collection, Maps Menus Emanations,
has just been published by Cyberwit.
