what a shame you return

to the sweet face

proven a liar

It's time for kings. The land has gone all seedless. Flat value lays grey in the dead field. To stand upright as one a high crime tried by doughboys. Demanding life be life I am scorned. Mocked back again small to the hungry swallowing womb.

It’s dawn. I’ve aged beyond ending. Meditation is forward. Forget what books said.

You read like an uninvited hurricane. Yelling at my face demanding compliance with a jack booted smile. If you would only shut your lips against your fear. Take a seat. My poor abandoned ears sharpen knives addressed to your shrillness. Spinning wheel words devolve us. The sun has barely risen from yesterdead. And this is your answer. Here is the tragedy made. How your theater misses. An audience framed in contempt and weighed in letters. These are who take the stage to perform for you a comedy of insincere listening.

In my evening slumber. I gaze inward at memories. You are there drifting in. Drifting out. I am tethered to our laughter. And the wild eyes you used. I see my hand cover over yours in the cold. I wonder if this is what is meant by heaven. My sleep approaches like slow motion stallions. There is no sound as earth and sea are kicked skyward. I close my eyes and know you once again. Your head with its wood smoke hair. Resting peaceful on the cage of my heart. And we in the embers of what once we called the bed of our forever.

Black hard corners of the maze shine sharp against the flat white light of the big star. I am standing staring up mouth agape as tourists do once on foreign soil. A dream lady whisper haunts my ear on the lacey breeze from around the next bend to the left. One short hedge. The bench grey and stone. Somewhere there is laughing in a man’s throat. He wears a transparent fedora that shields his eyes. Very tall this man turns and walks away from me on sight. Not one other animal save a cat black as these smooth walls stalks the grounds. I walk the maze behind it. Small but tough gravel crunches echo under my shoes and I am comforted. I would prefer the older innocence of a cool babbling water but in an absence this will do. Am I awake? I forget the dead word. Moment then to closing moment. Who will show me this is home? Perhaps it will be no one. Perhaps the star I see. Perhaps the maze is simply this. Perhaps the maze is me.

A field of books lying open on concrete. Pages flutter and fuss in the wind. Burning slow in the dry heat my skin upholsters my stories for others to read should they venture too close. A boy sloshing water over there. No shoes. I notice him and his head turns with a face too large for his age. It frightens me but I thirst. In this ever dead noon day sun I feel I am played as chess. The massive hand from the sky reaches down for me. I am sweating. All I see myself do is surrender. The boy is gone but the water is still now. The water in the well. I drink it and it cools my mind. I close my eyes. It spills from my lips wetting my shirt. It spills to the hot floor under my feet and sizzles away into vapor. A final act of thoughtless quenching.

I awoke to a strange dead line running through the center of my gut and the air outside was filled with a pastel pink haze. It seemed mourning had taken hold of my heart robbing me even of sleep I managed to find nights previous. The coffee was sad as was lacing my shoes. As were the distant steaming chimneys of industry. I would have curled against the back of the couch and disappeared into timid sobbing were it not for the slim solace and hope I found in the hot water and privacy of a shower where my teeth could gnash and my midsection hang loose in shameless defeat. As I stepped out the front door of the house into the crisp biting air early April reminded me of who holds local authority and grips the levers of choice. I inhaled deep and closed my eyes and smiled upward slowly thankful for the opportunity to work.

there the mocking of heart strings

yet not underground

pretend words needed in rain

Truth be told. All weather happens at once. When the black storm crawls over. The distant mountain. I’ve never been up. I notice how bright the blue sky is. Through the break. And in the midst of a sweltering heat wave. When my skin burns. Against the asphalt air. The scent filling my lung is not boiling tar. Nor is it pine beetles chirping on incessantly. Threatening wildfire. But the sweet wet shirtless salvation of the deluge. Promising its memoried approach. Once again from over the distant horizon of familiar tomorrows.

It’s the old leather again. Hanging from the old barn beams. A special way light cracks through the roof to stripe the floor. And the dust. A drifting alfalfa ghost muzzles me in delight - yes I’d rather not breathe but I do. Horses here once. And men. Back in a time we could still smell rain a day away. When floured aprons weren’t prison clothes but capes of goddess queens. Minding the hearth is not for the weak of spirit. She’ll not be tamed but by the wild beast she keeps. And he by her word. For in his hand is iron. With all intention of returning to the dirt it digs. Tomorrow he picks it up. Now the sun is down. And a sky of stars drives him patient toward the lap of his nature. She poured him water. Fed him bread. Eats a soup herself. In the silence of evening eyes they remember the source of eternal love. Him still toiling downward. She still soaring above.

the deepest difference

between living in the city

and living in the country

is that in the city

I am an absence

and in the country

I am a presence

A great split opens in the sky and rain pours down cleansing burnt asphalt of sin.

How long have I been under Mother?

Here take this coin says the air. Pass it into the hand of the one who points the way.

Then a great sound. The closing.

If you wish to cross the water on the bank you must leave some flesh and the weapon used to wound it.

With no hesitation my hand makes the mark. In silence.

Eyes up to see the other side is now where I was. And Mother stands human holding old bones from my stubborn insistence. She weeps. Waves goodbye.

Turning into the reeds and toward the edge of the dark wood the path is cleared. I step onto the running dream of my life.

Was it ever with me? Yes say the ancient words and thus is our rule.

Blood for fruit.

here a lonely seat

shining as the sun itself

perfect company

woke up with danger

disciplining errant dreams

seek deeper it said

If not from sacrifice, then where to treatment?

If not in the grip of dreaming days, then what should we for nights of peace?

If this word no more as with offense, which word next to soothe the tyrants?

If for passion given to the air in indifference, when say our eyes to cold eyes of strangers to ash?

If once said the tongues of weak men, from what the strength of thousands eating burdened cake?

If not from aged flesh bent calloused and full in the old land, why from your dumb fat rule books must my time become our blood?

I watch as fine marble forms go up in locks of flame. The chiseler’s hand betrayed. The horror of so many falling. Commanded sheep in blind prayer. To idols who but mock them as such. A hero needs his fans. The all too willing to live as slaves mob.