“it’s a good corner on which to sell balm” – James Tate
A ripe fruit built to burst, it’s-
longing for the tooth, the fist, a-
discerning eye to gaze assessment, “good,”
and highlight every soft spoken corner
with shrouded secrets even the skin conspires on.
The gnash of the teeth, the rot of the ground; which-
of these, is any better to be led to?
Either end will see you as shit to sell
though, for a while, you were sweet and glowed like lip balm.
The well waits open to the sky
a placid barrier below
silent bait for the passersby.
What water patiently poised
would want of the world above
only dreams will ever know.
The meager coins that violate the surface
swallowed by depths of darkness,
are but emissaries of whispered words
that beg of fate a future to bestow.
They gather amongst the sediment
an ancient glittering congress
perpetually pleading the case
for ambitions that died long ago,
lost to the unknown abyss
where light is known only by shadow
and purpose found only in fools.
Trees as thick as grass
bundled together hiding the sky
at night though
stars shine through
One could get lost in there
one could find something profound in there
in the morning
hidden passions
light the canopy like green fire
An untold history crackles beneath feet
crisp with the anxiety of breaking, unresolved
twilight is a pleasant mystery
whispers of color in silent darkness
the fauna changing shifts
timorous insects take flight.
A bright pink cross sanctifies the bark of each tree
some sign of an afterlife that none could imagine
The end is violent and sterile
the ground stripped bare
the canopy pulled back to blue skies
broken by contrails and wires
soon to be hidden in property
too expensive for anyone to live in
just dying slowly,
paycheck to paycheck.
The scaffolding grows in relation to failure
success
is not assumed.
Life grows with this malignancy,
While life after death life
cannot be presumed,
just an afterlife;
where we rise again to meet our every desire
and leave behind a world falling apart.
Our progeny can take shelter in the scaffolding.
Let our lives remind them, this is part of living,
only in death can we find true happiness
as serfs in a higher kingdom;
at least that’s what they tell us
the ones we serve now.
The door before me is an absurd sarcasm
designed to be a wall when one can choose
an opening otherwise
but has been a wall for generations now.
All children try the handle once or twice
deceive their friends with curiosity
laughing at themselves echoed.
In the years of life’s setting
we try more often;
with every passing,
hoping now the memories behind us
got it wrong – nothing in between.
All the time from bookend to bookend
we are overwhelmed with openings.
A coliseum leading us deep within
until we are more spectacle than audience
at last.
In youth and uselessness we look eagerly for a way out.
Sayyidna, my desert flower
the author of this refrain
though it is I that write it,
the ink, as always, bears her name.
The blossom of her life
contrast against the sterile sands
celebrated by each sparkled grain
inspires air to dance about the land.
She tells of water when it is unseen
she gifts color when the world is palid
She is thorns adorned on the defenseless
She is truth amidst the invalid
Where the sun takes all it sees
she will fruit with dew.
Where the sand consumes
she nourishes until I am renewed.
Though the dunes shift eternal
she, as always, will remain;
Sayyidina, my desert flower
the author of this refrain.
The blue light from the dash says it’s 2 am
otherwise it is dark outside of time.
Off the road, lost in nothing
the sounds are relegated to engine tumbles
and words that should have been spoken years ago.
To silence them only raises questions
louder than the answers they beckon.
In a place called home but a few hours past
three beds are filled with dreamers
who will wake to half the house their eyes set upon
while I will be awake still
dreaming of the opportunity to tell a story
where I am not a villain.
I whisper words to them they may never hear,
but deep inside they’ll still know;
though my voice is far away
I am always close.
The sliver between our open eyes
a slice between frames of light
that go on and on and on
like the water-colored frivolity
that supports those old cartoons;
bright characters in stark contrast
oblivious to the stylistic dysmorphia.
A flash of darkness
quickly set aside by the bookends of life
a pause so faint as to be forgotten
lost in the Kaleidoscope of colors;
the years as shapes, tumbling
on and on and on again
always different, always the same.
The universe moves unchallenged,
pufts of turmoil in the vast darkness,
and in that turmoil
flecks of life – flint sparks
quick flashes of light in the darkness
an irony like blinking
that goes on and on and on.
The day they shot our boy farrow
I did not submit myself before them
a disaster of the loss consumed by tears
nor did I sense any cause to implore them
about what his death might cost.
I was told the weight of his life
surpassed by far the weight of his death
and the space he left in his place
would leave us all bereft
only of the success we lost in his theft.
We could not in good conscience
succumb to the threat implied of his end,
silence ourselves in the loudness of his death,
and in doing, ignore the fortune of finality
to give way to the future and end the past.
Thus, when at last, our boy farrow died
I, as well as anyone else that day
did celebrate all the rewards that
were said to be coming our way
while the executioner looked
for a new soul to blame for our dismay.
A thousand pale flowers
caught in a gust from the east
beneath a cloudless sky
Grow Gray With Me 