Jessie G. Cunningham, Poet

	Jesse G. Cunningham is a writer of poetry and science fiction who has studied literature and creative writing at UCSD. He is also a musician and performance artist. Additionslly, Cunningham has worked as an editor and author on textbooks and reading companions.

The Zero Hour

Sol is up above in the cathedral of my self is in the
Split Psyche--the Mars God is there War hungers for
               Soul\Mind is how
The shows fire   the coals hot   it grows real   the spell goes:
Mmmm mmmm   hmmm hmmm   uhmm uhmm   humm humm

Stars from the ecstacy firmament shining through hyperspace
Metered photon parcels glowing fractured
Interstices luminate dripping excitement delighting
The crows between the rusty pages grip
Me beneath my own mind the sub heart in the hide out and rise

Interminable postulates determine the
Permutations resonations from the body
In my brain case with my thumb mobile and red blood
     in the rock hard
Bone house   hide hangs   bricks bang   loud clangs

Scape Goat my self taken beat hostage Break body
So then the Mind will be insane or may be free.
Harsh   injust   Self destruct   Mind implode   Self expand
               Soul explode

In Liquid Stone

enwrap me in liquid stone
encase me in hardening earth
enrapt me infinite
space without dimension
solid stillness
exist without definition
on slates of time
indelible

inexorable
spinning on magma ball
mud and rock gravity
force will throw us
together

as figured forms
volcano frozen
statues back
in womb and ashen
ground

when gravity
spins us
together
in dirt
they can wet
the clay
essence

shape
Us from Us
again

Driven II: The Pull of Atlantis

She swims
Arm over arm
Stroke for stroke
Across the gulf
Ninety miles of water
To the coast
Locked in a cage
To keep out the razor sharks
And piercing rays

One hundred chattering monkeys
Hang on the bars
Gripping hands
Prehensile tails
Jeering
Screaming laughing
Gesture genital
Display

Angry monkeys provoke
Baboon baring tearing teeth
Mad colobus direct
Eye contact
The howler shouts
Blows out her ears
The spider monkey
Drops from the bars
Rides her back
Pulls hair like reins
Drives her

No turning back
In the middle of the wash
Body swollen with welts
Poison jellyfish stings
She floats above a field
Slimy wrecks relics and ruins
Fights the pull of Atlantis

She cries for the monkeys
Her tears pain
Incite a riot frenzy
Of primal cheers

The moment freezes her
The fountain of youth
An automaton never stopping
She pumps for the shore
Invisible voices
The monkeys in her mind
Drive her

How I Found the California Bigfoot

Sorrow moons your face
Grainy Patterson footage
Presents primate form

Pairs of huge, muddy footprints
After light spring rain
Piercing howl and shrieking woods

Hair hangs braided rope
Woven strands in morning sun
Drip river water

Your melancholy ghost eyes
And sad loping walk
Your UFO connections

Elusive as myth
Furtive starlight scavenger
Creeps in night forests

Floods sprawling fortress redwoods
Like a tidal wave
But leaves no fossil record

Lonely human ape
I believed in you so hard
That you became real

The Sweeper

it starts and ends
     in layers of dust
          growing piles of
               near-weightless matter
          swirl in spirals
     cover
everything

the key is to realize
     I am not averting
          the end in
               dust and matter
          I am a channel
     a catalyst agent for
its subtle and vast
          gradual movement
               to cover
                    everything moves
          in the universe
     and my space
is to aid
     the shifting of piles
          dust and matter
               flowing in currents
          over distance and time
     guided by the brushes
of my broom

I become the direction
     of my movement
          holding the wood handle
               sweeping drifts of hair
                    dust matter
               sloughed-off skin cells
          insect legs
     forming piles whisked away
to form other
     concentrations
          and cover
               everything collects
          in sink hole piles
     gravity
gets it all

collects matter
     and piles
          I am my broom
               bristle movement
          direction defined
     in layers of dust
it starts and ends

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