Davenport Tomorrow
by Michael R. Burch

Davenport tomorrow ...
all the trees stand stark-naked in the sun.

Now it is always summer
and the bees buzz in cesspools,
adapted to a new life.

There are no flowers,
but the weeds, being hardier,
have survived.

The small town has become
a city of millions;
there is no longer a sea,
only a huge sewer,
but the children don't mind.

They still study
rocks and stars,
but biology is a forgotten science ...
after all, what is life?

Davenport tomorrow ...
all the children murmur through vein-streaked gills
whispered wonders of long-ago.

Keywords/Tags: Davenport, tomorrow, future, global warming, climate change, extinction, mutation, overpopulation, disease, trees, naked, leafless

for Thomas Raine Crowe

...These nights bring dreams of Cherokee shamans
whose names are bright verbs and impacted dark nouns,
whose memories are indictments of my pallid flesh...
and I hear, as from a great distance,
the cries tortured from their guileless lips, proclaiming
the nature of my mutation.

NOTE: My “mutation” is that my family appears to contain English, Scottish, German and Cherokee blood, meaning that my ancestors were probably at war with each other. Did my English ancestors force my Cherokee ancestors to walk the Trail of Tears?

I have recently created these new translations of Native American poems, proverbs and sayings ...

What is life?
The flash of a firefly.
The breath of a winter buffalo.
The shadow scooting across the grass that vanishes with sunset.
—Blackfoot saying, translation by Michael R. Burch

Speak less thunder, wield more lightning. — Apache proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

The more we wonder, the more we understand. — Arapaho proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Adults talk, children whine. — Blackfoot proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Don’t be afraid to cry: it will lessen your sorrow. — Hopi proverb

One foot in the boat, one foot in the canoe, and you end up in the river. — Tuscarora proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Our enemy's weakness increases our strength. — Cherokee proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

We will be remembered tomorrow by the tracks we leave today. — Dakota proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

No sound's as eloquent as a rattlesnake's tail. — Navajo saying, translation by Michael R. Burch

The heart is our first teacher. — Cheyenne proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Dreams beget success. — Maricopa proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Knowledge interprets the past, wisdom foresees the future. — Lumbee proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

The troublemaker's way is thorny. — Umpqua proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

taste the whip
ache just like a woman
but you break just like a girl
different colors made of tears
oui c'est la folie
chain reaction and mutation
it's in the air for you and me
welt rises

If I could grow another arm
with hands and fingers
to match the others
I would have trouble deciding
if it would hold you up
or reach for your help

The only reason I don’t seem so desperate
is that I’m limited
to these two arms
to beg for your thought

Mirrors stand on trial.
As my reflection has become treason.
Iris' clawing itself out of their sockets.
Screaming for blindness.
This cannot be who I am up close.
This isn't who I am on the inside

As touch becomes apocalypse.
Finger tips shaving and ripping
romantic runs down a spine
into an escape from hell.
The monster, applauding my imagination.
All fears confirmed by reflection.
The monster is me, stalking to taking stage.
Every pulsing orifice oozing out reality,
bites and endures flesh.
Pieces of everyone I try to get close to
becomes food.
Leaving the gluttons pink-red and full.

No dimension displayed without cauterized scars.
Deformation of the mind and DNA
Playing jazz backwards as the big band
Scolds its tune from the inside
I can hear the power tools of natures orchestra.
Brackish change, Chimera's blushing to proposal.
This is my favorite song
And it ends with anxiety of a new face.

The mirror telling it all.
Clumps of hair,
Eyes in hands.
Festering humanity in fetal position begging for death
after birth.
Blowfly meals for two lovers, eaten alone.
God's hands in face peeking through her fingers.
Blood dripping from immortalities ugly head.

Tremors of night and knocks on the door.
Coagulating depression finally answers.

Come in.

This is what I am on the inside, up close.
Make a plate for your eyes.
Anxiety is on the menu.

I used to say I’d be nothing like him
A mama’s girl, fierce and fearless
But there is fear.
I am afraid of what I feel
Of the anger that swells
Of my inability to stop the tide
Of the time my mother and I fought
And she whispered
you’re just like your father
I am afraid of evolution.
A slow process
That can change a harmless thing
Into something else entirely
I don’t want to be that something
But in my head a voice tells me
You can’t deny your roots
And by roots I mean a grave
That dug itself into the earth when I was born
And waits for me still
When will I become your sickness
An emotional  minefield where no one walks
A sadness that makes my feet drag
I refuse to become the person I fear
Because although evolution cannot be stopped
I am the mutation.
And I will not become the man who brought me here.

I'd share the sky
with the clouds
but I had to grow my wings
but I had to lose my skin
I dared to reach
paradise
but my brothers took my skin
but my brothers used my skin

and I couldn't let them win
so I had to let this in
now it's tearing us within
and it's the fruit our sins
cause I had to grow my wings
but my brothers used my skin

I made them crawl
took my time nice and slow
feels so good to lose control
like a witness, watched them fall

now I'm free to flee this skin
but I will not shed this sin
and I cannot be complete

I am a mutation,
an anomaly,
unique,
a rarity,
and other words,
that mean different,
and alone.

They keep throwing things at my face
Running away from this toxic place.
I plead and ask for a confrontation...
Nothing to do but accept this mutation.

They've been away now, for far too long
Maybe it's me, that they see is wrong.
I never deserved this kind of treatment,
but it's what they do for their own entertainment.

I know I'm human, not a toy nor a pet,
but it's all the cruelty and the insults I get;
Snickering and bickering at my every detriment
Always saying: I'm just a failed experiment.

They won't come near me, never again.
The terror in their eyes, they'll forever retain
Seeing the beast that I've now become
The wrath I've held in, I finally succumbed.