Kick crayons cross cement
a stream of consciousness unrepentant
a mind as still as lake fire
The sound file corrupted into distortion
Reflections of a memory graying at its edge
He dips to drink
Pauses
The stillness
Stones on the battlement
And decides elsewhere
To refresh
The surface has mysteries
Its own flotsam and memories
In all my diving
I’ve broken the surface
With little care
Or thought to its consequence
The best way to stop someone wandering down a path is a post sign
Or a person bearing directions ill-conceived or conceived for ill
And none of this matters in the dark when the stars wipe away like so much glitter
Or you’re standing beside me
Nothing urges the sick traveller toward the forest like a well-worn path.
Salmon at spawn
I am weighted down
And vulnerable
A splay of fingers before the walnut cracker
Yet all eyes including mine
Are on Dawn
I’ve chosen the coal mine
The gray lowlight
The crevices no one wants to clean
I’ve chosen the lowered gaze
the reverence of mourning as my song
a dirge only raised at eventide
when hope is less
and wanting more
Still nodding
Boughs wither
Praise fades
Wisdom leaves its tidal rings
Bits of skin and pumice
A jitter to her eyes
Half-steps bounce her close and closer to the wall
Neck stretched for a guillotine that will never hit
She’s asking me
To calm her down
To sing her a new lullaby
For the teenaged mind
I strum a cough
An apology for not being good enough
I’ve got one hand on her skeleton
The other trying to feed it into her skin
Humming cracks into calm exterior
Child, I say,
Child, I sing
Child, I cry
And crying is that new lullaby
And crying is that new lullaby
The tears you dare not wipe away
Worry the wrinkles’ pathways
To pillow and chest and hands
These helpless to soulscream
Absorb what they can
His forehead
My pockets jingling
A migraine into view
I’m about to fall and he’s lurching
To save me a bruised knee
Lavender vision
Sheathes of tiny pinprick blooms
Blind
Gasping in notes
I’ve got this
And I’m gone
Fields and feasts turn over
A world spun free and rotten
The hair and gas of dog
On a long line common
A world still soaking
Its bunions and stresses away
Past clover and cover and Mammon
On a long line common
Savage as wolf
Starving
Peculiar as man
Starving
Biting down
On a long line common
AbyKittiwake 