floating and leaving no trace
Well, I said I’d do another reading, and I have. Here is is:
You can find the words to this poem here.
Also check those brave souls with amazing voices who submitted their own auditory offerings this month. And see the older Open Mic readings right here.
i misread the signs
and altogether missed
the portents
slept through the ominous
omens and peculiar
prophecies
the rain of blood
should have been
my first clue
and i suppose the swarms
of frogs and locusts
and locust-frogs
might have hinted that
something
was up
but i was busy
holding your hand
so the end of the world
well
let’s just say
it could wait
begin in water
a stinking slime
of protein chains
so many links
of uncut summer fat sausages
emerge from the last life
dripping wet and bloody
emerge into the next life
pave the way
dripping
wet
bloody
our veins, rivers
leading to the ocean
of the heart
the salty water of
our throbbing veins
our throbbing heart
one ocean with many names
one heart in so many chests
we float
we drown
we float again
——
a robot types this
you look at the screen
you say
no, those are words
from flesh and blood hands
bone-cored fingers
that is someone’s voice
trapped in amber
locked in photons
but
the rust in my wrists
and my grinding ball
bearings betray me
the processor of my heart
ticks ticks ticks
a cycle overheated
overclocked
my heat sink
overwhelmed
i have sharpened corners
a six-sided box of a man
i don’t breathe anymore
so i can live my life backwards
everything flips
mirror-reversed
my past wriggles like a snake
drawn endlessly from my spine
a magician’s trick of
of unending handkerchiefs
outside a beautiful evening cools
while i think about
school and how far
i have run from learning
a damned
thing
when the world was new
and the sky was still
a thing of darkness
the animals strove to
fill it up with light
the lion
climbed the highest tree
filling the air with
the thunder of his roar
he became the sun
the fox
curled into a circle
near a lake where
her reflection blurred
and she became the moon
while the cat and the snake
argued over who would accompany
the fox in her nightly journeys
they did not see the finch
pluck hair from the lion’s mane
from the fox’s tail
and scatter them
through the darkness
peaches hit the ground
i pull less eager fruit free
in my mouth–soft, sweet
taking a walk
through the industrial district
near work
is just like
being in paradise
you have the real breeze but
it can’t compare
to the warm wind whipped up
by the giant delivery trucks
and rumbling passenger-less trains
or the sweet scent
of diesel and gas
borne gently
on that wind
like a lily’s fragrance
the ground shakes
with traffic
as if the earth is new
and making itself
ex nihilo, ad infinitum
everyone tells you
that after this life
there is another life
but no one warns you
that death waits
also for you there
and after that ending
there’s another
paler incarnation
again and again
each life more diluted
than the last
until you can’t tell yourself
apart from the sea of white noise
a revenger follows his hate
knife bloody from one life
to the next
so eager to re-enact he gladly
sheds his flesh and bones
until he and the despised
become one
and there are no more screams
only the emptiness
of the eternal hum
——
the light is gone, replaced by gloom
cold water laps my feet unseen
by all but keenest twilight eyes
i linger long before your tomb
antique lions patinaed green
my sole companions of great size
i wait here with them for my doom
above the darkness grows between
the stars wink out so many lies
you said you’d wait while pale you grew
i’ve killed this world to join with you
——
for
Jane Dougherty Writes
Poetry challenge #36: Drowning leaves/trilonnet
First line: The light is gone…
Words and Feathers 