the imaginings
of the lonely heart

wander within this page
and beyond.
sent like beacon lights

out into the darknes
of the heart's distress

out across the waves
seeking another life,
another living

seeking connection,
a return other than
plaintive echoes reply

into the dark
the deep, deep, dark

a butterfly
of heartstrings
and hope,
sent out
into a hurricane

and somewhere
there sits a soul,
weaving a net
of love and lonliness
awaiting a battered
but hopeful butterfly

Dishes served full are well laid on the table
prawns are glittering adornments
though only yesterday
their tentacles were tasting the river
not knowing they would be in another water
in the river of saliva
grinded and pulped for a tasty moksha.

The rain falls unabated from last night.

Who'll go out to feed?, asks a voice.

Does never being hungry feel the same stress
as being hungry most of the time?

The answer is in the clouded eyes
watching the eyes
joyful for one more chance.

(3:00 AM)


Just a few hours of sleep not a fiber of strength felt  in a body lying supine the mind so awake a rapid flow of rebelling ideas could not be contained thoughts quake needing a break in the dark of this 3am morning with the ipad providing light the body seems to languish in its own inertia only the chest rises and falls in silence behind the hills sunday dawn glows

Sally

Copyright October 1, 2017
rrab

My grandparent's house
ten-kid-large and sinking
on the corners of remembrance
Remodeled now, to
...tenements

Honeycomb
...the remnants

Irish immigrant and Scottish orphan's child
She sang on the ferry
He fell in love
"The rest is the history of us...."
Wide
as the Connecticut River, grieving--
in their sunset....
____

This-- chair
is his

I am afraid of it-- of his learning
of the shiny badge pinned to his coat
of his dying...
Golden leather of it
soothes
his memory--
of another continent
of the once warmth-- of a distant hearth
so darkened now--
where his head once rested
...his hands
and,
I fear--
his mind....

I will not sit in it
as if he will come back, to take his place
I am afraid of him--
with his chair--
all worshipful and empty
like a high place, abandoned
to the heart attack
not for grandchild play
Seat of Authority
still stamped
beside the standing cold--
brass ashtray
Pipe smoke imagines itself
against the ceiling in the words
of Yates and Milton
He read to them
and somehow--

Paradise is Lost....
_____

This house is cold now-- even in the summer-- cold
Worn as only large families wear
The War
of waiting shadows
--four brothers who were spared

Anna Mae, in charge, too young,
worries in abrupt dark
of dinning room
Her face, haunted--
an archway-- ever empty
by the large and ghostly table
covered by its web of lace--
a bridal veil
of Catholic impossibility...
Anna Mae, held hostage by her thoughts
of darling, Sean...

Aunt Lil's “breakdown”
with cigarette and thorazine  
quaking quiet in her corner

Aunt Nell,
as blind as smart-*** hell
ironing, darning
with threads that thatch
the wounded socks
Holds it all together, scolding--
Brought the welcomed jelly donuts
sneered as Yankees clobbered Boston
all-- while drinking yellow ale

Uncle Eddie-- laughing hoarsely
cracks nuts over a wooden bowl