The gleam of the skyscraper is like sunlight on
a pond glimpsed through trees or a free
and joyous river

I am thirsty, yet I have no desire to drink. The well
is poisoned.

The towering architecture opens to the marvels of modernity; their shining windows reveal
the revered throne rooms of CEOs, and workers tapping away
an army of ants to ensure order, according to their rules
and handbooks but above all
by uncertain individuals watching those around them.

And the violence of their tapping keyboards and polite emails
and the penthouses to which they aspire
the life of a bank throbbing
through the steel skeleton of a building that is larger than life,
larger than
those left to die
      trying to get some sleep in the streets
      kicked in the ribs by police
      a different kind of life haunts their heartbeats.

The city has swallowed its own streets and sidewalks
and spits out skeletons
bones dry from its desperate extraction
****** to dust to coat that shining cityskape, the sweat and blood drained from pores to make the steel and the glass
drips away slowly, revealing only dust.

The well is poisoned -
I am dying of thirst -
I wonder which death
will be less painful

The dust storm was so strong
I could barely see out the window
Of the abandoned facility
I had been sent to salvage from

Charging my torch I say by the window
If I pressed my ear close enough
I could make out a sound
Enough through the storm

It must be the loudspeaker I thought
Somehow it survived the bombings
I listened closer and heard it drone faintly
As of giving out orders on a work camp

After a while of straining my ears
The storm died down a little
To where I could plainly hear
The speaker system outside

It appeared to be counting
Though not in a language I understood
It was a monotone female voice
But there was something odd

The voice never repeated itself
Like a normal announcement
Or warning might do
It just counted endlessly

The storm cell must have passed over
As it returned to the ferocity
Of machine gun sand
And deafening winds

The halls and passages were dark
The only light my rechargeable torch
In the gloom and shadow
Of this monsterous abandoned complex

That despite the long war
Had forgotten to die

Part I.  Like Gods Falling

At first—
new trembling
and then she didn’t want
to be—

alone

with guilt

or seen

as **** half-eaten evidence
So she held it out to him
with her half-hearted, “It's OK.”
her crippling distance

“Why doesn’t she just embrace me
as before?”
He thought
that he had never seen her eyes that way—
with no words for their ruin
he loved her fearfully more

Gorged in the aftermath of forbidden
fat and animal fruit
Sick with excuses
Staring at
the core of lust
Rationalizing
Food?  Beauty? Intrigue?

Wisdom!

Searing awful terror
into each other’s minds

Part II.  Love and War

In the years between
the harrowed rows of sprouting corn
they found pleasure without plan
that bound them more than guilt had severed

How curious the textures of a man
in sunlight

her power?
In all the brilliance she had bargained for

How curious this burning for her
in the sodden life of rotting

She was always holding him now
from the scorching day
as the earth sizzled and swam
in seas of senseless—
background drone of locust and revenge
sealed in sweat and clutching labor

She was always holding him back by night
from the icy crackling mad!
his restless hunting hate!
And sometimes, while she pleaded
he would seize her
Make her pay!

For that afternoon

by the well where the boy was washing
A basket of vegetables returned
a bowl of blood

Part III.  Grief

Prepare the darling carcass
Shroud it in her pleas
clawing in the mud beside its silence
consumed beyond all fire by her anguish
“Can this not be enough to make him move?
Yes! He did! I’m sure I saw it!”
Can this not be enough?”
to stop the knowing…
grief from pouring into space?

Not even light escapes
____

Returning from the Mount of Meeting
hollow chores
collecting fatwood
grinding joyless grain

From corner of her eye
she watches the boy
walk toward the forest
spear in hand
She pauses
looking down
at hands on stone
that once had cradled...
Breath catching on jagged sorrow

She continues to grind

bitterly pregnant


Part IV.  Endings

Descended now
Reclining heap
reflects before a sun’s surrender
His face gleams with last light
hair blown back by volleys of wind

Her face
Not visible
as we are behind them
Her head rests in his lap
She is on her side
Soles of her shoes
mute and toward us
His eyes search the sky for a god—any god!
Her God

Exhaustion poses them past
the point of question
When the matter of “Why?”
becomes each other

Close in

the net of twilight
Dulled of hope and pain
at the edge of all that can be done...

...everything is gray going on black—
but we always knew that

I write my hopes and
dreams across my soul.
Whomever discovers
the story I carry
within is meant for me.

aw so,
you think you want to love me?
an you think that ya can?
because it's a hell of a thing yeah,
this crazy new plan,

but OK,
so,
let's go,

will you love me- my crazy
my chubby- my lazy?
when I am an orchid
or when I'm a daisy?

when I am annoying
an I'm acting a pain?
will you love me my whacky
as I try to stay sane?

becuz' I'm like the moon
an lovely or not
well I wax an I wane

sigh yes,
even then I will stay true

good, cuz,
mostly I'm peaceful
tranquil and playful
I'm busy with life too
yeah I want me a day full

of loving someone,
who looks JUST like the stars
all shiny an sacred
who'll whipe away scars,

each day I'm a changin'
an each day I will try
right now- yeah evolvin'
I'm not wonderin' on why,

why this or that happens
an why it can't change?

when did he stop to lovin'?
when did we go estranged?

I'll not switch this or that now
I'll  not have rearranged,

I'm not waitin' on nothin'
but I do hope for it all
someone to love me
an to catch if I fall

I just want now to breathe in,
I'm not lookin' for love
instead I'm here waitin'
on the sweet heavens above

to  change my heart -
or his heart
whoever he is
until then I can but sigh now
for I still know true bliss

in simple living pleasures
and the joy of simple things
like barbequed warm sunshine,
an a church bell that still rings
and how I can finally sing now
an man how I LOVE to just sings!

how memories they do tweak us
an how memories they do alter,

as reality it too changes
as the memories they too falter

especially when I am,
I am alone at the alter.

where I'm a prayin' for peace
an a hopin' for rain
to release me the past
any unending pain
to finally let go
of the things felt in vain
whew geesh,

for even those things
they change with the time
an just like this poem
and in every new rhyme

so you think you can love me?
and you'll love me sublime?

Yes.
I do.

I do
love you

I love you boo,
yes yes its true!

hey what can I say
this feeling is so new,
phew, I'm relieved,
it was a conversation
we needed to have
so ..then
let's come together
RIGHT now
very
X-citing possibilities
await
this new love is,
very exciting
quite different
well it feeelzzz just amazing,
to be over the moon in love,
freeing and wonderful,
that MOST special feeling,
you wait like-
4-eva for?

well that feeling,
I know it today,
an I hear it's even called-

"self-love" ❤

I am looking in the mirror,

yes I do ~ I do love you
Ma Cherie!

Ma Cherie © 2017