.          Seized by the moment,
          the gravity of a memory
           lay closed the window
             to the outside world

               Eyelids surrender
            in the breath of a sigh,
         the silent pacing footsteps
unable to walk beyond their shadow
       nor their footprints left behind,

      never needing to turn around
               to look back to feel
      the weight of every laden step
         across the old Arch Bridge
        spanning the river far below

             The cold wet sidewalk
         rumbles like the throbbing
              heartbeat still echoes ,..
                     resoundingly,
           through the muted voices
          of a past buried away alive

                 Halted footsteps
           become a blacker silence
                  at the precipice
     of the Arch Bridge railing ties;
   revisited deeply with eyes closed,
         wide open so many times
                 before  and  after
  that  long abhorred day since past

   Reliving an old noir silent movie,
       tarnished time and the river
              coursing through it,
    remaining unable to wash away
    the stains of that watermark tide

                 Standing   frozen
      as a weatherworn bridge tower,
  high above raging waters far below
feeling a cold chill, empty as a pocket,
            perpetual teardrops flow
  filling an empty thimbleful with love

           A thimble seems so small;
               just a pitted silver cup
       to shield from a piercing pang,
              and yet  a welling  love
             uncommonly  overflows ―
        tossed over the bridge railing
             toward the river below
       to see if hope really does float

            Seized by the moment,
          a random act of kindness
            and a thimbleful of love,..
                    lay open again
            a pensive soul's window
                to the outside world ...


                 rivers ... 11/06/2017

Crimson maple buds magically pucker
under brightening skies
Lenten rose reluctantly unfolds
absolving the shadowed snow,
stemming the wintertide

Spring's impending bloom
mystically stirs the delicate human heart  
soothing from outside its sheltering shell

A converging pleasantness
of a sunshine sown awakening
cleanses each morning breath drawn
to sate an urgent restrained longing

The wilderness carpet comes alive
with a burgeoning salient sweetness
drawing out a glimmer of gladness
from stale suffocating darkness’
wallowing in the winter ennui

Another kind of poignant balm sinks
from the tall mountain willow tree
touching the sprouting blue sky

Furry fragrant catkins blossom sweetly
like the remnants of a love once known
softly brushing against a fading memory
of unerasable stains begrudgingly beget

Like fawning flowers falling fallow
in a passing season’s pollination breeze
Manipulating frayed heartstrings,
unhealed as the deer peeled scars
and rubbed bark of a mountain willow,
scarred  from another season past

Some protective shell ― never grows back
when benign heartwood is brought to light


harlon rivers ... Spring 2018

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

I’d gladly go somewhere else
if there were anywhere to go
somewhere I might belong
where I might breathe
and simply be
yet it doesn’t matter where I go
for I can never get away from me