Blues for Ugolino

There’s this bloated float in my brain,
that swings into action at unexpected
moments

boasting

of an edge so fine upon
infinitesimal edge, though it is unable
to negotiate

my release at crushing dawn;
a ray, bent like the sudden
spike

in my arm, erases the slow
lines that mix
through it,

press

the revolution on me, pure
like a stone grown
frictionless

in the moonless ether
of time’s collapse.
(like an ass in black slacks),

It swings into action, Father
and does not tremble
above your grave

of such liquids
of your choosing, but
between guilty dawns

skips in and out
of its own
deadly rhythms

making the horizon
endlessly seem
to disappear



Finney's Drinking Again

Who hangs this drunk
attitude on an inverted
crucifix?

tying a time together in a
vicious tomb while

a song goes
skipping
over the grooves like
a syringe bouncing off a vein.

his loose mood lifts
the stillborn moon out
of a crib of wax

it's dark again, and I
have diminished to
the suburbs.

the poplar holds
birdsong (between
the teeth of the leaves)

her eyes broken, guiding
my dreams into what they,
tomorrow, might have become.


Paul Renato Toppo was born 1959 and raised in the New York city area. He graduated from the University of Connecticut with degrees in Chemistry and Mathematics. He has lived in Spain, Puerto Rico and México and currently works in New Jersey, but spends half the year in Mexico City with his son, who continues to be his adoration.