The Ghost of Mina Loy

From her thermometer earrings
& salt-teeth. An example
of feverish swans –the pulp
of goose-down pillows.

Her luminous fingers clasp
the dawn’s brocaded halo. A space
for the absentee husband. A space
for womanly coquetry. A space


inside a space inside an envelope
missing letters, missing vaporous
gestures.Dismissing the God between

sentences. She is somewhat
of a heretic ghost; her translucent skin,
observant opal. She writes in human mist,
the aromas of sweat pungency.

A crystallization of breath. With alien
thought, the mucosae of subliminal flesh.
Exists the calligraphy of ecstasy--
the tender nerves of shadow ink. A woman

for eerie gauze. For the shapeliness
of heart-mouths. A red. Emptied
of its blood & mercury.