-

stripping off bark,
carefully neat
unbroken
strings,
and then
into the bone
of the branch

bigger chips follow suit
as the carving
continues

the knife peels, chunking
out rough pieces as
they litter the floor

later to be swept aside
into darkness

years pass in solitary
cutting as cars
go slowly by

looking where the front porch
is buried at one end with
the chips of his wilderness

displaying no
ornaments
to show
for the labor

no birds
no raccoons
no whistles
not even his cane

pare of nothing
but the pile—

all he is...


s jones
2020

.

I was desolate.
The sky was never purple or pink
I was inside, and my heart ached.
I ran out of things to do
I lay in my bed staring at the fan taking rounds.
There were tons of manuscripts, waited to be complete,
On the brown wood table on which paint has dried upon.
The canvases have fallen down; the nails are still deep into the walls.
I still tie curtains into a knot so that the sun will shed some tears on my bed too.
The lights I don't need anymore hang on the walls.
Mails are all left on read, I remember there used to be 506 unread.
I'm exhausted of doing everything in my head, the bedsheet is falling off my bed.
Thoughts that make no sense are crowding in my head.
I have no place to keep all the clothes I never wear.    
My hands feel manly sometimes, but feminine at others.
Like when I hold a knife or want to color.
I pull the hair-tie off and my hair fall onto my shoulders, bounce; they feel soft on unpleasant days. Cliché
I live not far from the ground, though if I fall I could possibly die.
There's a light I intend to use for reading at night, but i never do.
I never read.
I write, I bleed
I write, I bleed
I write.
I bleed.
And to reading,
I don't pay heed.

Wasn't the one that fit in,
   table to myself, an ocean
                          of pressed wood

that I float on alone....


But...


    You know there's always a but,

Never really wanted
                                  anyone
on
       my life raft of solitude.

I just look up and know
that
        there's
no one to obscure
       my view of life...

My ocean is a fishery of thoughts,
                                  that are mine.

Swimming into
  uncharted life choices...

But I'm fine alone,
I'll talk to the fishes
every now
and then.

But throw them back
             when

I've finished with them..

Cicadas singing
Crescendo in the dark wood
Summer's droning chorus

Tome stones of wood
           honouring those
who used to gaze upon
the beauty before them,

     sitting in reflection.

A tiny plaque with
      a name respecting
he loss.

Now others
    sit in respect of the
          one sat here before.

Gazing into the surroundings,
                deep in thought,
of a world passing them by.