I seem to be broken now.
Pieces fall as strangled
shapes to the floor.  
I toe them, looking
for the edges to rustle
back together.

Fragments fall.
Dried edges and shriveled
meanings.  (The torn
remains of my old age.)

I think I am broken.
My poems drift
off as blowing leaves
in a dry season.  
I rake them into
a pile.  The crackles
and snaps. The ends
of thought.

I write this to save the few
remaining poems I have.
Words fall from the
dustpan of dry letters
on a cold night.

Caroline Shank
1.20.21

There is no escape...
A creature of evil—the dark!
You roam through the night well hidden—
ghostlike!
Your strike –
a deathly finesse! Crushed, smitten,
he falls down – your victim, your mark.
There is no escape!

I am touched every night
By the darkness,
The twisted, pale fantasies of an unconscious mind.
I am always the great protector,
Trying to save them from the evil he inflicted upon me.
It never works.
How cruel is it that I can remove him from everywhere
But my mind?