Warring colors busting at the seams,
the day-burnt sun's fists
sag and dip into the clouds,
weary of the battle the night has won.
And the night sired children,
restless as the dawn,
riveted the dark with metal sheets
and armed it with visions
of an obscured future
polluted with hollow promises
stirring in their minds.  
Hope lay dying,
dank with mold and blood,
her cries met with clogged ears
and barred doors.
They were against mother,
she who fills their bellies with
rice and corn,
she, who pours water onto their
glass to the brim,
she who softens their fall with
carpets of moss for their bed
and canopies for shade—betrayed
and thrown out with the wolves.  
Now these,
and what sorrow to behold
hands holding up their voice
snatched and pocketed
for a bushel of grain
to fend off pangs of hunger
away for days,
in return, all their tomorrows
until none to spare.
Mother why have they forsaken you?
You gave them life,
now they bring you death.

—e.d. maramat | erwinism

Run, run while you can;
while your toes can spring from the asphalt;
while time is on your side
and the wind is behind you,
and the world is a trail of blur.

The cartilage of your joints,
fresh and oleaginous,
pliable as your young mind,
can take you to your destiny;
can satiate wanderlust,
a bitter aftertaste for a time long gone
of a weary spirit
tenant to a rigid flesh.

Breathe
the scent of life in.
Let your lungs and air,
like lovers who have folded
the distance between them,
savor the embrace
throbbing in their minds at night.
Breathe the scent in,
in time,
they grow stale,
planted in water by the bedside
wilting with apologies
and well wishes
dancing to the music
of beeping machines.

Up the hills if you must;
through mist,
yielding not an inch
to questions
doubt pours on the road.
Against the unwillingness
of your body,
defy,
and when its defiance ripens
in its season,
your spirit shall burden
it a heavy swathe of obstinacy.
So run,
for the loan of time digs deep in the pocket to claim interest,
pay your heart in full,
before foreclosure.
Time inevitably demands its due.

—e.d. maramat | erwinism

Pulsating light
caught in the mirror,
what sin have you?

I see your hair prickling,
your skin bleached pale,
from rich in sun’s goodness
to a shade of despair.

Your hand had the warmth of a corpse,
as if an omen, as if to say,
your fate had been decided.

Something treads through the air,
no sudden movement, eyes down,
punctuate your sentences
with a resounding sir and ma’am.

Roll down your window,
wear a pageant smile,
serve who you are on a platter.

Swiftly, heavy thuds on the road,
on either side of this quivering wagon,
figure morphing into a sentinel with
glassy eyes.

Life flashes before our eyes,
dripping as if a cold maple syrup
over a cold and stale pancake
served at a cold table in winter.
    
Was it how we trotted?
Was it how we fared?
Emptied our pockets with
wrongs we had none.

Draw no pistols,
plant no bullet that shan’t grow
and swell into chaos,
we need none of those.
We prayed.

But came,
an honorable man,
a man unlike many,
he said fear not,
the bridge ahead is closed,
an apology was issued,
for the inconvenience.

We turned away,
the night ceased chasing us,
the light faded,
we were safe.  

—e.d. maramat | erwinism