You sit-unmoved-
In your Mountain fastness.

The tree Spirits frolic,
Hiding, slipping trunk
To trunk until, uncertain-

Your Belief transcends.

A single tear ploughs
One runnel down a silted
Cheek
And the Flood some day

Shall unleash a grim
Vengeance on those who
Forgot-

Our place in Nature
Ruptured,

We hasten toward
The failing Cliff

Your wart,
When it went-

How I missed
Kissing

Your little
Blemish

A grotesquerie of time
Sculpted faces
Litter the landscape.

Classical columns stand
Jagged and broken or lie
Forlorn.

A soft oriental anxiety
Hangs in clouds over yhe scene,

And all the waves of
History fall.

The shift proceeds-
A drunken monk
Misdeliberates his
Kung Fu.

All is change
All balance is wobble-
The sun sets-uncaring

I am neither this nor that,
Neither here or there.
I do not talk too fast nor
loud.

My ego rides on me like
a rug. It needs vacuuming.
Today was a pretty dusty
day with lists and conversation

written with the accouterments
of my old age.
I am a fantasist.
It shows in my mistaken
choice of you.

You cannot hear me.  I am too loud.

Whatever I have to say is not
a flower or a song.

I am the avatar of she who
left.  The husk of intelligence.

If there are questions that
are unanswered  ask another.
I have the memory of a
conversation, an admonishment,
a loving reminder from someone
who was wrong.

And the reclining apneic
experience to

sleep. To say

my

prayers to the God of my
understanding


Caroline Shank
4.17.2024

I always choose the losing side

They wear the prettiest silk
Woven clothes
And die

In droves