Sitting in the morning mist today
(it’s 2 AM. The battle started
early in whistle-shrieks of
incoming artillery shot
from fear’s cannons
and terror’s trenches.
They tore me out of dreams
into this nightmare waking and real).
It’s the day of memory, the day of the dead
(and the living who wish they were)
and the day of me, survivor
of this war on us,
waged from mile
3001.
The sound of sad owls
(like haunts) and elderberry blossoms
(fragrant in the dark) and me inside
a Dresden of memory and fire and sound
and the machine gun prattle of stories
twisting back on themselves in your hands
like snakes striking those wrists
so clumsily tattooed in crude ink and fantasy.
I heard the house creak and groan
(maybe it was just my heart’s hurt moan)
and I swore for a moment I thought
you were there, laying in bed and peace
while your chest rose and fell faithfully
and your face, wreathed in blond curls
that smell like Heaven’s very bakeries
still in sacred rest and repose…
I fought my way back
and across the years
to where you lay, then, there
to have but one whiff yet again
of those locks of gold and God
to sustain me in the midst
of this uncanny clumsy conflict,
this war of atrocious inattention
but your room was empty
(my mailbox is empty)
and it turned out the house
was just grieving for its loss,
the house is empty
and my heart is lonely
and the spray of sorrow begins
to anoint the roof from the skies
and soothes the ache of loss,
the lovelorn lack of presence
and the absence of any laughter.
I never dreamed that you were
the kind of person who just sashays in
and then waltzes right out
of my life while I am
making music in 4/4 time
but if I really think about it,
I remember the time you were
last here and as you left you
flashed your eyes dark at me,
filled with orange fire that smelled
like burnt chocolate and you spoke
silently with that glance
straight into my heart, a look that
was a blade slicing thru the music,
(that dissonant dance)
and you said in one glance
that you wished my mother had
had an abortion
instead of me…
In that moment, the tide turned
in this war on us, and I had
a flash of insight that would
make Lorenz so jealous:
I knew who the
Unknown Soldier was
and always would be.
Like this:
Like Loading...
You must be logged in to post a comment.