If only I owned the Moon
I could charge the Poets

But I do not own the Moon
And must view Her Face,
Imagine Her Dark

With You

All seems different,
like a blurry landscape
with vanishing maps.
The distance from the past
keeps growing.
I slice through space and time,
on the chosen path,
along a trajectory of circumstances.
Against the denial of access,
against the gate closing,
just to hold together what was apart.

In place of shadows
sunspots and creases
an embankment the gray of day seizes
      nailed to peril as a savior
      pushes out all traces in its labor

Dust and smoke
--the heartless void
above the faded ring of hope
      say a sated prayer
      for your fellow wayfarer

I'll shield your body between
the rays and surface
I'll be your dark clouded step
     when your own feet fail to purchase
     into the ground they sink

isn't it enough that the wind
makes tumbles of the umbrellas

that dark staccato notes of rain
strike with such force that we pause
  
our busy little lives and marvel at it?
isn't it enough that the very next moment

the sky turns so impossibly blue
that we remember we all have wings?

Isn't it a spoiled life:

picking flowers on the edge --


of the precipice?

I climb over the wreckage of you -
bent rusted iron, crumbled stone.
My cheeks - stained with soot,
hair -  dandruffed with ash,
skin - raspberried from sweeping the concrete
with my knees.
I unfurl the flag,
emerging from the tumultuous cocoon
of your cannon fire.
The colors fly - dancing with the bullets
in the summer soaked breeze.
I can just make out the haze of the gate
through the thick smoke pouring
from your tempered chest.
A smirk flirts with the corners of my mouth;
The resolute defense of the ruinous gloom
you will carry in dingy bags
made from the cloth of superiority.
I will feast upon a slice of cake
in the golden glow of morning.