The bee broaching
this flowering ****
alone in late afternoon
doesn’t know the hives
are dying.

Her work lies between
these white petals.

Still, she may have noticed
how few butterflies
color the air.

Kale greens. Beets grow fat and wine-dark.
Carrots spin sun into fibrous orange.
Someone carried soil up these stairs.

Onions open long fingers into the morning fog.
Small herbs and winter squash keep quiet company
here on the rooftop while sirens pass below.

In the afternoon one or two leave their e-mail
and ascend to this improbable place.
“Put your hands into the dirt,” a doctor advised,

and you’ll feel better.”  There is a time to plant
and a time to reap.  A time when nature, nearly
spent, needs tending in small places.

Boat-weary immigrants lay bok choy along
the sidewalk’s edge.  Geraniums bloom
in window boxes.  Here and there

insistent chilis dangle on a bush in a half-
barrel.  A rooftop is world enough for now.
You don’t need forty acres or a mule.

A few square yards, drip line, a couple
of spades and willing hands suffice.
The rest is blessing.

A flickering sign appeared
In the shape of a jagged boy,
Who raised his arms high and said,
"Rain will fall.
Rain will fall."
And we'll be free.

Danced in the dust 'til night came.
Clouds chalked and choked our feet,
Until we swallowed the dying sun...
Sets in me.
Sets in me.
And we were free.

Why would you bother?
Why would you cut so low?
Expressions fracture,
The breaths arpeggio.
All for your nothing...
Your heavy fall shapes my everything.

What's the attraction?
Your tricky undertow's
A cruel distraction
From rocking too and fro.
And when the dreams come
You must stumble, tumble from yellow skies.


Sky shuddered and the world came down,
And I'm still here.


Speak to the child,
And hold him in your arms,
Be reconciled.
And as forgiveness calms
Your weary wary,
You will float, float from yellow skies.

~~~


Come listen...

https://soundcloud.com/wingless-night/yellow-skies

"Have some faith..."
No lotuses on your screen;
Some girl from a magazine.
They call her Kayla, babe, what do you think now?
"Rest your head."
James tells me that it breeds sin.
What leather-bound bubble he lives in;
Just full of excuses  - big books have their uses...

Won't you see snowflakes are heavy with shame,
They fall to the ground to blend in with the rain.

Appetence, tell me, now when was it born?
The same day the beautiful rose got her thorn.
(You'll see in the end that Black Beauty won't bend).
Boreas, those blue eyes don't go unseen,
But for all that scrubbing, some stains won't come clean.
And Kayla discovers you can't eat the covers

Won't you see snowflakes are heavy with shame,
They fall to the ground to blend in with the rain.

So give up your ties to the ghost in the skies,
And sing not the song that brings tears to my eyes.
I'll take your blanket, just leave me the cold,
And you can keep warm with the lies that you told.

Won't you see snowflakes are heavy with shame,
They fall to the ground to blend in with the rain.