No one stays long
in the house of the bereaved

The hounds are lonely tonight
but not the priest

I dream I am still
in Tennessee grieving

Drinking moonshine
and branch water
looking for a fight

The undertaker creeps out
of the farmer's daughter's room

His wife beats a spider
with a broom then sweeps

When Death beats his child
nobody listens to her weep

My mother used to beg,
Son, don't write about Death,
We'll cross that ditch soon enough

I have nothing but respect
for the dead, I said

But there is no doubt in my mind
Death is a bad dog, a real *****.

architectural mollusks
    are falloping through
                              my brain
                        squeezing past the
                         instincts that
        have kept me down
My instincts,
              once brittle sea stars
                          that splintered
                                    into cracked
                                 peppercorns,
                 are now mixed with
           the breathy liquid
        of squid,
lubrication for
the spiny paths ahead
They blow their ink
between my
inverted vertebrae
      injecting Jello into bone
                           busting through
                        fiber and tissue like
                          fresh-skimmed
                    lavacream
and all my muck
rises to the top
in a neon rawness
that I find beautiful

Soon
my burning crevices
will be cooled
fossils will turn to flesh
and, as sure as knowledge
springs into action
I will make
for the shoreline
like a cephalopod rocket
silky smooth
my fins spun into wings
touching magic
as they glide

there was no power

from my Mumbai hotel I
could see the stream of people
in the narrow street below

a cart carrying the dead listed
and nearly toppled over

the ox pulling it did not stop
dragging the askew carriage along

passersby steered clear of the primitive hearse
knowing it carried the curse, the fever felling the denizens
of this muggy megapolis

a plague harvesting souls
quicker than they could be burned

the Mithi was thick with their ashes,
diluted only by tears of the mourners
who harbored fears they would be next

I was there, a helpless healer;
a doctor turned detective, running
a race to find a cause, a miracle cure

all my potions impotent,
all my staring at slides a lesson
in limitations, ignorance--a discovery
of crawling creatures too miniscule
to be dissected, too beguiling to be
understood

my eyes were tired of looking
at the tiny death moguls and their victims
my ears weary of the entreaties for relief
from suffering

yet I stood and watched, one wagon
after another, carrying carrion for the pyres

I prayed the power would stay off,
for light would have shone on me:
a curious survivor, unworthy of whatever
grace kept me from the heaps of lifeless
limbs bound for the fires of the night

My father and I
lie down together.

He is dead.

We look up at the stars,
the steady sound
of the wind turning
the night like a ceiling fan.

This is our home.

I remember the work in him
like bitterness in persimmons
before the first frost,
and I imagine the way he feared
the pain, the ground turning
dark in the rain.

Now he gets up
and I dream he looks down
into my brown eyes
that may as well been his.

He weeps and says goodbye,
my son, I don't want to
go yet, but I can't wait
around to watch you die.

it is about you.
no lovesickness to rock your empty body.
no guilt to beat like a drum in your chest.
no anger, no hurt,
it is about your skin.
about the light that you drink with morning coffee.
how it reflects off of your curves.
about the corners of your mouth.
about your cold feet,
your gentle hands.
it is about the grass in your toes.
the air around you, above you, below you.
the water that you drink from.
the earth will take care of your wild roots,
your wild hair,
your wild smile. the earth will take
care of your lovesickness,
all of your pain.
all of your guilt.
you touch the world with your gentle hands and
it always touches you back.
you are composed of what touches you back,
what you can sit still and listen to.
what buzzes inside of you,
what you contain and
what you allow to escape.
it is about you,
it has always been about you. not
your hurt, not what callouses your palms or
haunts your clasped prayers.
it is just about your body,
every part of your body,
from the bottoms of your feet
to your fingertips, your
nose, the ends of your hair,
it is about listening when the
earth tells you, this body is
okay. this body is enough. it is
about how everything you touch
always touches back.

I was walking
and the ocean
was above my knees

I didn't feel the cold
or mist hanging silent
above, but I knew
the darkness, old friend,
longer than I will admit

I knew the waves
in ways I know
I could never explain

You found me there
and called out for me
to come out of that grave
I was sinking in, I don't know
how deep I would have gone
had you not known my name

I should drop to my knees
and kiss the salt from your feet
thanking you with the sea on
my lips and leak salt of my own
offering gratitude for calling

Thank you through the mist
and waves, thank you for
my heart beating, not feeling
the cold, for my lips that never
tasted the lightless far below

Thank you for following
my footprints when I was lost,
drowning in a sea of sorrow.

I hadn’t meant to spy
just an evening’s walk along the beach
knowing that things are sometimes strewn there after storms
between a gust of wind—a break in clouds

Coming upon moonlight
gleaming on wet teenage backs
Two—
by a leaning erosion fence
fondling the last discoveries of childhood
fumbling with the barriers of her bikini
behind the erosion fence
out of sight and forbidding

Breeding like sea grass by rhizomes
prowling that neck, those *******
Gasping! Warring!
for the land of white warmth below their tans
His hands grip, lift, position, insist
By such undertow
mouths and hips pinioned in disbelief...

where they cannot be seen
two half-rounds in rhythm – struggle in the surge of being

as the surf binds them in refrains
about the ankles

An indifferent ache swirls in the silence
throbbing like a dancing candle flame;
no one understands the heart of silence
moving the darkness with its ancient dance

Its voice is only felt but never heard
the way it whispers the reality it bears;
disrobing the nakedness of a fragile heart
exposing inherent truth deep in disguise
retouching the chaos passing of love laid bare

Unspoken emotions that nobody hears
float around a muted tongue benumbed by fear
doubt is a bitter taste that knows not love
searching for a labyrinth to begin to wend a better way
trying to feel the unfelt warmth of love in an endless cold
waiting on a frozen emptiness that never thaws

No one understands the haunting fear,
... surly it couldn't happen again ― and surly it will,
a heart stifled silent,  silence doth loudly peal
                poignant dreaded words:

                 "It's not you ― it's me ,.......
      I love you but I'm not in love with you"

and like winter dreaming for the sun to reappear,
to come back again and dry the memory of fallen tears,
a hushed heart falls off the earth lost in ether shadows lay
mooning in the lonely silence within moonlit dapple

When you pull love too close ― it will push you away
some silence heals ― a dissonant silence cuts to the bone

       Only the lonely feel a silent voice sigh
         Only one hears a silenced heart die ...


               harlon rivers ... March 2018