Somebody burned the house
she said.
Frying steak.

Long live smoky kitchens
and those who are
called to the cause.

We are all molecules
in motion riding a
colossally failed experiment.

Non sequiturs abound in
my world.

Smokey kitchens.  
Metaphors.

I hang my head.
Slowly clear my
thoughts.

The kitchen remains.
the Abode.

There is nowhere

else

to go



Caroline Shank
9.26.2022

Tree limbs spike the
air.  Fingers
shred summer skies.
Wind is the
sliding movement
realized.

Life is rhythmmm.

Wind storms sand.
Red is the color

of skin.  Touch
forshadows response.

Bodies remain.
Awareness
regained.

September's shreds,
tears, shells.

Tomorrow hides
in snow.


Caroline Shank
9.25.2022

is a circle.
The
minefield of
breathing.

I inhale.

The rasp of a door

hinge.

Gone to rust.

Pieces of
time.

Jigged thoughts…

clang of
chains.

Soggy Days.

Lie wet
leaves.

Rain..

The air pushed.

Behind me a
young woman

falls.


Caroline Shank
9.24.22

Blue carpet.  Stones
between toes. Sun
seamed afternoon.  

You.

Salt foams on shores.
Wet kisses my dream.

Walk on. The
lights of South Beach
a kaleidoscope.  Moon
paths. Warm breaths
on my mouth.

Tide breaks.

Salsa brings the waves
to ******.

Daylight comes.


.
Caroline Shank
9.23.2022

The yard.
The wide green yard.  
The rooster lifts his
trumpet to the Lord.  

There is the song
he practiced for the
sermon.  The choir off the
fence.  The Duck plashed
and the piggie counted
down.

The Serenade, his song
of Songs.  

The chicks wait
as they
we're told to do.

Billy's coming home.

The wooden fence is
cleaned.  
His flag draped.

The song
ready.

Billy fell in the ditch of
Unknowing.  

His war
over.  

The Rooster cries,

Taps.


Caroline Shank

To perhaps
remember?

Life lived before.
The leaf circling the
sky. The breeze on
skin.  I know it.

Or I feel it.  The wind
like kisses.
These things

just beyond thought
glisten like oil on the
synapses of experience.

Glimpsed on one
side of consciousness.
Saudade. To be
in the
dream.

To feel nostalgia.
To wonder if

it all might have been

different?



Caroline Shank

Summer

The stream trickled on,
the frog jumped in to cool off,
the branch creaked with loss

Autumn

autumn golds the leaves,
the cool breeze stirs the summer's
winding song to winter

Winter

Wind wraps around me,
I breathe in the winter air,
the cold ice crack snaps

Spring

Clouds form.  Cold North winds
toll in.  We run toward Spring,
slide.  You warm in me.



Caroline Shank