Black-winged with blood-red heads, they gather round.
Offering no lamentations, no respectful pause, they feed.
Such scavengers appear to have a shrouded mien.
This is solely our imputation.
In the distance a dog howls.
Rain falls from a darkened sky.
Vanitas vanitatum et omnia vanitas.
Echoes in my empty heart.
She hands me a bouquet of flowers with heart-shaped leaves.
She smiles shyly as I put them into a vase and says,
“These are beautiful, just like you.”
How do I tell her that I cannot will not do not do this?
I know that she presents more wants more,
That this floral gift is but a prelude and opening question.
Best to dash these hopes now.
She can find another who sees
The glorious pink, the gentle fragrance, and the tender silk.
Not I, for I see all this yes but also
The wilted brown, the musk of decay, and the brittle dryness as they die.
I kiss her gently, a parting farewell, and walk her to the door.
This is love.
Supine in corpse pose.
I close my eyes and count my breaths.
In, out. In, out. In, out.
One by one, my bones leave my body.
They hover disjointed in the air.
Other bones appear.
All begin a caper mad and whirl in abandon.
The universe is nothing but dancing skeletal relics.
Then comes a singe clap.
All motion ceases. The bones dissolve.
Only radiant light remains
And the fading crackle of a death rattle.
One rain drop.
Immobile, suspended in the sky.
An invitation for those who dare.
From its expanse a black monkey with spidery limbs
Climbs out to clamber in the moment,
Wildly dancing and throwing leaves.
The water from which it emerged
Hangs for brief eternity, serene and still.
These two, the unchanged bead and the frenzied beast,
Are the same to open eyes.
I close my hand around each,
Put them in the pocket of my coat,
And trudge down the wet tarmac road.
Stay away from the gaps.
I consider these words then intentionally
Step into the in between.
A bird flies on the wing; a branch sways in the wind.
I hear the sharp notes of a violin, the warning whistle of the noon train.
Where are these things In the halt from inhale to exhale?
Snap your fingers, and they are gone.
I am not here. I am not there. I am not.
When I went for a walk,
I came to a fork in the road.
This is not a metaphor.
A silver utensil lay on the pavement,
Tines upward and pointing straight ahead.
As I reached down to pick it up,
I heard the mocking laughter of Hecate,
Goddess of the crossroads.
Foolish mortal, open your eyes.
I followed the branch on the left
Never to be seen again.
This is what happens when we tell the truth.
From our mouths fly gobs of flesh and splinters of bone.
We flay ourselves from the inside out
To stand before others without our skin.
The cuts inflicted by words used with intent
Drip with definitional ichor.
Are you a deity in your own regard,
To leak divine fluid that flows with gifts?
Are you a mortal among the rest,
To discharge weak liquid that drains away life?
However you are, you bleed.
We all see this but choose not to know
That our eyes are open yet blindly opaque
That our hands are dripping with shared gore
That our feet are standing on infinite decay.
And even our quietest voices
Scream with a deafening destructive howl.
Time runs on, but our time is running out.
Agamemnon is returning to Mycenae,
Cassandra by his side.
The sails billow and tauten,
the hastening winds driving the ship onwards.
When he leans from the bow,
Does he taste the salt tears of Iphigenia?
When a sudden trough shakes the vessel,
Does he remember her terror?
Cassandra does, but her cries go unheeded,
Stifled by Apollo’s cruel regard.
The Erinyes murmur with the waves,
The curse of the gods on this family woven indelibly.
Whether he is blinded by arrogance or ignorance,
Small matter either, for his fate remains fixed.
Clytemnestra is waiting with her axe
And a mother’s implacable fury,
While on her is fixed Electra’s pitiless gaze.
O Atreides, each of you is born on a funeral pyre
With the cold laughter of the gods your chorus.
Good will not prevail here,
Only sorrow and sorrow and sorrow.
What do you expect?
Niceties and pretty words
Tied round into a neat bouquet,
Bound with sweet sentiment?
Look elsewhere then.
You can find this with ease
On shop placards and inspirational clothing.
I do not provide that facile comfort
Or join my voice to the specious clamor.
Only seek my work if you care to find
The hidden barb that wakes us in the night,
The grinning skull that lives within our mirror,
The sharp dagger we carry behind our backs.
Kindness, beauty, and truth dance around us,
Held in the cries of dying children,
The perfumed stench of garbage mounds,
And the glint of light off the barrel of a gun.
We turn back to our familiar dramas, our distracting entertainments,
our serious gardening, our daily concerns.
We forget, forget, and forget again.
Of course we do, in our commonplace struggles.
Still this knowledge remains.
I won’t write it away.
Not even for your smile.
This is what happened.
I went to cross the street.
I took one step off the curb.
I was in a different country.
I did not know the people.
I could not understand them.
I read their kindness in their eyes.
I hope they saw the same in mine.
I wandered lost on empty streets.
I listened to hear familiar birdsong.
No avail, no avail.
I turned to see a passing train.
I crossed the tracks.
I stumbled on the uneven road.
I was once again on familiar ground.
Nothing had changed.
Except me.
I am a stranger now.
Unseen, unheard.
My footprints disappear in the grass.