The threads of nostalgia bind me to this patchwork blanket
of soy farms and swamp land horizons.
This region has birthed me from her soil,
and in Midwestern arms I am sheltered.

Chance is a flippant mistress

Yet, she has blessed me with vision

Eyes to rebind the seams

Of two souls victim to division

I see her coming through the fog

With lips that could speak words past the grave

I see her march to the rhythms

Of the winds, the earth, and the waves

Lost in a blanket of fog

We dream of decades long past

Worlds of such perfection and youth

Worlds, gone into the night

Spiral pathways mark the truth

Long winding roads of tireless intricacy

Falling from every angle

Walk on, Man of reason

The Future, the undeniable truth

We have for us an unwritten plan

The pen strokes yet to dry

We have all the time in the world

I keep my feet firmly planted

The ground is my only ally now

My knees tremble as if the world were crumbling

Beneath my ten exhausted toes

Maybe if I just stare off into space

The moments will slip by quicker

And she won’t notice that I’m late

To the only thing that matters to her

-

Maybe she’ll believe I’ve been here from the start

Or if she already does, my breath might slow

I ran with all my might

But time is hardly on my side when my tie won’t tie

And my laces won’t lace

Did she see me yet?

Is she’s waiting on that stage?

Waiting for her turn to chirp her tune

-

I wait for her name to be called

Hoping she hasn’t eyeballed me in faceless crowd

She’s a shining solo star

And I’m just the wondering weary witness

Fear was my drive and pulse

But relief was not there to calm my hammering heart

Her precious name did not ring in my ears

For I missed her tones in time by a mile

On this day I rise to the astral plane and break open the void

The strange matter leaks forth from space and takes an unspeakable form

-

My portal grows so rapidly

With the power of the stars combined

Spilling forth the ancient ooze

That for eons has been confined

-

Such power above comprehension

A conjuration beyond human mind

This plague springs from the cosmos

Leaving only emptiness behind

-

The space in between dimensions

Belches out the element of old

Overtaking all terrestrial matter

So precise, unthinking, and cold

Throw me to the ground
I want rise up like a sprout in the fresh rain
and breathe the same air that you do
I want to shed this skin and know that I’m finally alive again
and not some brittle nymph shell
Forget everything and let’s rewrite it all

Sing a song for my humble eyes

With the voice of the fiery Sun

And when you get to the reprise

Do not falter, do not run

Floral print dresses
for the girls
who stare past me.

Those vulpine eyes

and crooked smile

could hold my thoughts steady.

The sky is missing a maiden,

and the sea is missing its robe,

but sheltered are you,

in the mists and tears of

a time when I was loved