Daughter of my life you are
still so fragile.  

I wait for the phone call that
will come any minute

Someone come and help me.
I grieve for your childhood. The
weather of our lives before
storms drove me underground.

You did your head to the
storm thing. Face forward to the
landscape of your reality.

I, underground, hid your self
against me.  I rode the waves
of your addictions.

To this Winter day I have only
the remnants left of your
early years. A few pictures,
a stuffed animal named Coffee.

You cannot come back to me.
Gone are your bounce and
the hugs around my waist.
Your tears that filled my brain
with helplessness.

You are all alone in this trap
of my mind.  The madness
slips through me.. Your tears
are but dry sand.

I want no tears to your
intentional desertion.
Silence to your pleas, and
old music before you

were

born.

Caroline Shank
12.18.2022

How it beats
Who it beats for
Your passion
Your strength
How to treat it when it heals and breaks
Remember wounds that run deep
Knowing your heart and my love goes with you

C@rainbowchaser 2023

Five billion years
from this day
in time

Will there be
anything
of this
world I know ?

What of oceans
or even snow ?
What of the dirt ?
I ponder so

I'm afraid
there will be
nothing there

A burnt out sun
and empty air

There will be
no longer dreams
or hopes

Just vacuous space
that's no joke

So what of man ?
Will he be long
deceased ?

I'm afraid
that will surely
be the case

After the sun
swallows whole
Turns the planet
into nuclear gold

And every molecule
and atom
whose energy
has been
spent

What will happen ?
I come to think

What if by chance
the sun goes nova ?
Casting our remains
from a supernova

Will we shoot across
the eternal bliss ?
And end up
collected
by a gravational
cyst ?

Who knows
for no one
will be there

Only the promise
of time
and distance
suspended
not even
in air

in a room of unimaged beauty
with curtains woven
from threads of unused dreams
and carpets embroidered
by imaginings of crumpled poetry

songs of hope and fantasy
are left unsung
written on blank pages
carefully laid on the piano
whose keys are all black

here is served perfect tea
in exquisite porcelain cups
each place set with polished silver
giving no reflection

the Things That Might Have Been
are the only guests
they appear in their seats
translucent and shimmering
gaining solidity
staring at their perfect tea
in its exquisite porcelain cup

but they do not drink

if two materialize at the same table
they gaze at each other
with pleading eyes
needing with all their fragile existence
an answer

reasons may be exchanged
but not one of them ever
has an answer

they dissolve
hoping to return
for an answer

leaving behind their perfect tea
in its exquisite porcelain cup

When this mortal frame does falter,
If there be left a body still to burn
Cast my ash from the cliffs of Dover
For on the winds I shall return.
Though my soul may be lost to water,
Bones bleached and turned to dust
My heart will soar across the forests
Climbing mountains in the dusk.
Then as the daylight rises
And darkness gives way to light
I will cast these eyes, one last time,
Across the shores of life.