I take a step back, pivoting on my right foot
to remember behind me a clearing in the trees
by the old apartment complex
where dirt raked over by lifetimes of weary
American walkabouts
snakes down hawk-eyed, single-minded
toward the old muddy river.
One might brush aside broken branches
blocking the way like so many nails and thorns
but I know the way.
At the bank where acid rain and sewage
can lick the dying summer dandelions
I try to cash a check for one epiphany
before it starts to rain more violently.
A suitcase probably designed to hold a laptop
lies abandoned by a crushed beer can and
a newspaper clipping filled with prophesies
written to a dying world about a world soon to be dead.
I look inside but no glint of metal shines back
at unsuspecting hopeful children eyes.
Turned over with a fallen stick
lying in a field of blood nearby
a giant slug is stuck to the back of
the faded leather bag dropped for
God-knows-what-reason.
A snake slithers away back up the trail,
I hear a hawk screech into the gray sky,
and I swat a spider hanging from
the nearest tree almost alive in the sunset
bearing the weight of the world.
Feb 8, 2011
Feb 8, 2011 at 7:03 PM UTC
I take a step back, pivoting on my right foot
to remember behind me a clearing in the trees
by the old apartment complex
where dirt raked over by lifetimes of weary
American walkabouts
snakes down hawk-eyed, single-minded
toward the old muddy river.
One might brush aside broken branches
blocking the way like so many nails and thorns
but I know the way.
At the bank where acid rain and sewage
can lick the dying summer dandelions
I try to cash a check for one epiphany
before it starts to rain more violently.
A suitcase probably designed to hold a laptop
lies abandoned by a crushed beer can and
a newspaper clipping filled with prophesies
written to a dying world about a world soon to be dead.
I look inside but no glint of metal shines back
at unsuspecting hopeful children eyes.
Turned over with a fallen stick
lying in a field of blood nearby
a giant slug is stuck to the back of
the faded leather bag dropped for
God-knows-what-reason.
A snake slithers away back up the trail,
I hear a hawk screech into the gray sky,
and I swat a spider hanging from
the nearest tree almost alive in the sunset
bearing the weight of the world.
This poem was published in a student literary magazine in 2010.