She lands,
leaving only dampened hands--
Evidence of her stay

Spending her most memorable time
urging a  barefooted girl to rip off
the itchy black dress stained
with sweat and graveyard soil.

Such a sour cliché
introducing me to
June, my only
heartbreak.

Tomato plants bent in half
weighted with ripened fruit,
swollen large enough to
split its skin,
steaming in the overgrown garden.
She laughs like warm rain at the way the fruit
and I hang--

suspended. Growing heavier
in the humid heat of yet
another smeared dusk.
Eerie breezes slide through the leaves,
my messy hair collecting her
featherweight secrets--

bringing still faced realizations that
it's easier to hear June whisper
"There is only one thing you can be sure of,"
than to empty the shallow oxygen stream
from my tributary mouth
back into her swallowing sea.

Tides rolling in and rolling out.
"Only one thing to which everyone agrees."

The thing about June is,
you can’t decline the annual walk.
The thing she’s hiding is
a tall ledge in a pink haze
through a field of wild strawberries.
Letting me fall with silent excuses,
I am too heavy, and she
too light--

*"The thing is, everyone will die."

Doe eyed, she looks up and asks,
"Will you carry me?"
Halving the rhythm of footfalls.
Honesty in his action hitting the
first notes of a lasting song, holding

fulfillment and fear in the
form of a little girl in arms.

Loyal through the swells- music and storm,
teaching things that he had no business knowing while
conquering things that had no business attacking him.

When the fork in the path
read that he must decide between
Rest and Moving On
he quietly comforted his aching heart
and limped further,

Apologizing all the while to the ***** faced child.
Her arms around his neck choking him, warmly.

Finding peace in their relentlessness,
certain that would
carry her when he no longer could,

taken with the idea that
death was the needed break he awaited.

It seems
that the moon is
blushing.

Mars must have
whispered something
sweet.

All she sees are unfamiliar belt
buckles and bottom row shelves
Seeking something I'm frightened
for her darting dark eyes to find
Wandering the maze of mundane
isles in the busy super store

A sunflower of panic blooming in
her small chest, pressing against her
fluttering heart as the clicking of her
tiny boots increases in tempo
She is Gretal, leaving glimpses of the
swishing pink tail of her oversized
nightgown to guide me as
she dashes around corners and legs

My strides double hers and a smile plays on my lips as
I match her pace with ease
Letting the shelves between us guard her fragile security
"Are you lost sweetie?"
My calm voice beckoning her teary eyed glance She nods
two times, certain

Her warm hand fits into mine
Together they swing like a pendulum
"I can do tricks!" she giggles
letting her feet hang Too thin I think
carrying her effortlessly
I say that her dress is very pretty Disney
princesses beam, frozen that way
I meant to say that she is much lovelier
than any fictional character

She smiles anyway

The route to the shoe department
fails to sustain its urgency
Her soft lisped chattering
ushers my foolish grin

that falls quickly when I realize
we are being watched
A stout woman wearing a malicious
mask over a face that
was once fetching before the poison
that fed her addiction

My heart drops and I pray
silently that this is not who
it inevitably will be
Her mother, to ****** her
from my strange hand
with an unyielding grip
on the little girl's upper arm

Greeting the child with a raspy
"I'm going to bust your *** when we get home"

My jaw falls open, empty
My hand falls to my side, empty
I want to fill my mouth with
chastising words towards the mother
and comforting words for the angel faced girl
I want to fill my hand with
my fingers, a fist, delivered to the woman
and take the little girls hand once again

I watch the purple hearted girl
be escorted away without
another word

Purple for her favorite color, but purple because she's been
wounded while serving her God given, God ****** mother

She smiles anyway

All I see are faces blending together
and torment
Seeking something that I'm frightened
I'll never find
Wandering the maze of mundane isles
in the busy super store