if a forensic
          scientist
fresh from
a crime scene
          were to
investigate
our woods
         & forests
would they
find blood
spattered
         patterns  
scattered over
chestnut trees
in deepest
      Mississippi,
a crimson
            history,
years of
          brutal toil
embedded in
the soil,
where children
played only
             the day
before,
perhaps if we
      all could see
we might tread
a little differently,
         investigate
our own hearts
meticulously

He is a delicateness
a tender beautiful mess
He is the softness of
the papers of an old book
He is that forgotten wetness
of shy kissed lips
He is that sudden leap in her heart
when she smells rain
He is all those tiny things
unseen and untouched
Believe me he is
all that I have touched and cherished.

He is the emptiness
of a broken summer's moon.
Believe me he is.

The course of a cloud is not my course.
The void of the sky is not my void.
The shifting wind’s not blowing in my direction.
Life is no longer up in the air.

Today the lines in my hand are my map.
All roads lead everywhere.
Today there is no walking away,
Only walking.

9

In the garden hard with frost
sits an old man with furrowed eyes
staring at old decorations
dangling from branches
overhung with snow.

His forced breath sinks into fog.
He cannot feel
the rising of a warmer wind
or the furrowed ground
beneath his feet
poised to ooze life.

I am afraid of his eyes.
I turn away when he looks up
at the waves of geese returning,
thawing the ground with their shadows.

Anger builds, like a fire
Neglected flames only grow higher
In the heart, the intention burns
Making smoke with dark concerns
Undulating through and through
Scorching only, the inside of you