She whispered
In his ear
As he closed his eyes
And counted back from 10,
Pretending he had made a bomb
Inside himself,
Ticking down
And down and down
Until that final click,
And the switch would flip
And his eyes would
Alight for a moment
Then darken.
She whispered:
"Please, just one more day.
Don't go. Just one more day."
She whispered and his eyes closed,
And she counted her heartbeats
As she watched his breathing slow and slow until he inhaled and
Stopped. And in his last breath,
He heard the click,
But there was no bomb,
And no great boom,
Just the click,
And a soft movement,
Like a leaf pushing against the wind
As it falls from the tree.

Who drives the wind?
The battered steppes in the North
Stand mute with cracked lips.
Where the roar of ocean crash resounds,
The wind whips like some old tyrant.
He whistles, remembering her pleasant face,
Long dead.
Then he takes up the whip and whistles some more,
As he strikes lightning on the tattered shore.

Withhold nothing, but let the droplets drip
And cluster and dry and age.
Speak in reverse so no one understands.
Let the steam build and collect
Until the pistons break
And the whistle resounds
Pierce shrill rising and rising and slowing.
Moving up and up into nothing,
Forgotten. Erased.
An imprint in smoke.

Delicious Delights
Frought with terrible Frights
Giving my heart a horrible start,
On this starless night.

Mysterious sirs,
Bearing wonderous furs,
Looking at me, plain to see,
Moving in blurs.

What may I do?
What might ensue?
They, whom I vanquish in all of my anguish,
I can undo.

Fears are faced,
Dastardly Dangers erased.
As if I, giving it a try,
Laid them all to waste.

Your utter complacence is
Perpetually mitigated by your patience;
Yet, since we've met,
Your ubiquitous,
Splendidly liquidous,
Serendipitous humor,
Like a tumor,
Has beguiled me,
Defiled me,
Riled me.

Your delicious,
Surreptitious,
Obfuscation of superfluous condemnation is
Erroneous and felonious
A frantic and pedantic antic.

Chastise all further entertainment
Is the heart of our enchainment
Begins with fetters about wrists
Are wrung til red
Is the color bulls abhor
Not the one who questions
Are without answer
Til He who comes restore.

I lept into darkness and the darkness took me back.
I felt around, looked high up, then low and down
But saw naught but black.

I wept for want of light and the darkness wept for me.
With sleeve I swept tear, but still this formidable fear
Of what I could not see.

Then joy! What pinprick peaked out of light afar!
That I wondered could it be so? At once my heart saying no
At sight of distant star.

I made to sprint, but the darkness sprant behind.
Trodding on heal, with terrible zeal,
Saying: “This will not bind.”

Still I ran with ferocious will, and let darkness be ******.
Feet sinking deeper at first, then climbing with insatiable burst,
Through mounds of black sand.

Star grew faint, and the darkness darkened,
Then as fire ablaze, all in a wondrous haze,
The light us hearkened.

“This way” it whispered, and “WAIT!” I cried.
Then the darkness shuddered, hearing all that we’d uttered,
And left with “goodbye.”

I lept into light and the light took me back.