All of these fires of the heart
Burning on the surface like the last remnants of
Of a civilization nearly gone;

Huddled forms tending flames that
Beat back the dark
Through short hours
Stretched along a dying road.

Ever since I was a little girl
I knew
We would all leave here,
Alone.

Are we really anything more than scattered bones
Across the open undulation of the plains?
The scavengers stretch their wings into the sky and dive
To sift through the fragments of life we
Leave behind,
No more significant than fallen leaves along the forest floor
Before the snow comes;

Yet, there is warmth in my skin so strong
It wants to burst forth and form a new star out of love;
Something that hangs above this pain
And calls rivers out to run
Across the dust of nothingness
Before the sun dies, at last.

And yet, it is not enough

To halt the trains of time.
My children and I
Sit outside a hollow station by the iron tracks
And keep these flames alight;

Their laughter,
How it
Colors the sky
Red and orange
And their souls hold back the night.

Still, beyond the shadows of our bodies at the edges of the fire,

The darkness is a tide.

What words should we speak into the void so that it does not

Rise?

Wounded and bleeding internally
On the side of the road.
Trying so hard to breathe
Trying so hard to live
In a body that is inevitably dying.

He does not expect help.
There is no way out.
Blood is staining the markings on his legs.
Blood is staining the pavement around his broken shape.
Blood is falling, falling, falling
And there is no end
But pain.
There is no solace in this suffering
And no savior came.

We drive on by.
He must have jumped the fence at the wrong time.
Though meant to scan the wild grasslands,
His eyes
They were simply
Resigned.

Sometimes there is no one that can help you.

I remember when they pulled the lines
From the back of my father’s hands.
All of those medicines of hope
No more potent than sand.
No other alternative
No other possible plan
Than to accept this death
Like a lone animal
Crumpled by the side of the road
Eyes fixated on wild lands
He will never, again roam.

And it is similar with the soul.

Bleeding out from secret wounds
That bore into the insides of our bones.

And no one knows.

And no one sees.

And so we sit in silence
And so we hold our grief
With the resignation and the glazed eyes of broken, dying beasts
Out on some empty road.

Until someone kneels
Down beside you
And finally, finally

Sees

Cupping your face in his hands,
He says,

Look at how you bleed

And though he cannot completely, ever
Stem the flow
And though no one can completely
Save you now.
It is like a burden lifted because

Finally,

Someone sees.

Finally,

Someone knows.

You are no longer simply abandoned at the edges of the road.

Someone hit their knees beside you
In the pools of your own blood
And reached through this impenetrable emptiness

With only love.

Only

Love.