creationism

The rain spatters the rooftop, the rain kisses the windows. The rain bursts and dwindles and then the day is gone. Nothing left but the odd notation of dirt and water, the bundles of mud and mystery, the worms on the pavement and the birds on the line. Nothing left but light switches and door hinges, a life squandered on knobs and locks. Not even a letter left to say good-bye.

They've all been called up to heaven. They've all been returned to the earth. These dreams that waver and fade beneath the slow burn of this awakened day and blunted night. The dreaded whethers and the fond tomorrows dissolve, clouds caught in the flooded gutter, tattered by the flood. Hopelessness and mindfulness synonymous for a moment, the mirror another tide loosed on the world.

The slate is never wiped clean. The new world is always mostly rendered from the bones of the old one. The creep of continents, the crawl of life, the clambering vulgarity of language. All the motion that slides beneath the senses, the truths that enchant and confound. The crush of perpetual mountains, the call of all these runaway stars. Nothing new under the sun. Nothing but beginnings that never end.

all the labor

The storm blows in the distance, the day surrenders to the breadth of shadow. The hours trickle sweet and slow, honeyed lips and soothed throat. The moment won has long since dissipated, hands and pockets both notably empty. I breathe the silty air, blowing smoky kisses to an instant long expired. The world just turns on and on.

The sky boils, clouds and a freezing rain sweeping in through the gaps in the terrain. Skin chills, gooseflesh rises, the night stretches and pouts. I wait as the sun slips away, I wait as the weather chooses its weapon. Watching the world diminish to porch-lights and glowing windows. Watching the world as it waits to pass me by.

The world will leave you without a word. The world will swallow you whole. It isn't personal. This life is only what you claim and cling to. This life is all wonder and fume. The instant is hidden in your roaming blood. The moment where everything is waiting. The moment when all the work comes due.

listing

The colors all give it up to gray, dusk settling into the wide reaches of the parking lot. You cross with caution, brake lights and back up lights never entirely indistinguishable. The coffee shop crawls, clientele bearing the difficult burden of choice. No-one knows you here. When they finally get to your order, they ask if you want room for cream.

You slow as you cross the lot again, trying not to frighten any shoppers with your speed or bulk or dishevelment. Not that there isn't the potential, but most citizens are poor judges of horseflesh, and their antennae never seem to be scanning for intent. It doesn't matter that you are just another consumer, coupons and shopping list at hand. Fear and nightfall go hand in hand.

You enter the grocery store, and all the colors have claimed sanctuary. These convolutions of need and want, stacked high and sorted into rows of like and convenience. You shamble through your list, filling the cart with milk and coffee and laundry soap. Everything searched for found, in order and in kind. You complete the ritual of revelation, and they ask you if you found everything alright. The question has to be a trick, but you just smile kindly and say yes. No-one needs to know any better.

museum piece

The song plays out long before the song is over, the cluttered track and the worn-through voice. All this singing despite the bird on the wing, despite the words buried just below the earth. All this music despite the gear tooth clatter, that grind of bone into blood drenched bone. Each break placed just so, club to gut and limb. Each bruise another rainbow claiming skin while the soldiers do the work of the world.

All these kings and bishops, these fatted moon-calves and desperate potentates. They slash and burn and strike all around them, they thieve and scheme and invoke gods they cannot name, then cry fowl at the first sign of resistance. Money talks, people talk back. We know the story before it begins. We know the brutal truth. Forget the crowns and shepherd's crooks. Every stone will have its say on these long dog days.

The tale is simple, once it is sealed behind the glass. The fable is always founded upon some hard sharp truth, the heart of the telling all the proof that language will allow. It becomes a museum piece, safe from dust and change. It becomes part of our journey and a road we think we will never travel. Then one day the guards all raise an alarm. The tale is gone, the case left empty and open. Forget the crowns it goes, take back the kingdom.

plutino

There is a lost star hinting after the horizon. There is a dark horse lathered into a froth. Put it all on the assembled devils. Put it all on the gathered teeth, so small and sharp and lovely. They will shout and they will name. There is no one turn where it was all lost. There is no one moment when it all went wrong.

We are called by love, we are called by gravity. The bare essence of a conspiracy, the raw bones of some kind of trust. We avoid the ordinary orbits just long enough to wear the face of the stranger, we drift with undue pride and purpose, touching each and every soul we pass. We are lost soon, at home in the mass of other people. It is so dark and cold out past the ordinary orbits, we pretend that there is nothing there.

So there is the pause of distance. So there is this reach of want. All these roars and whispers, every one just the shimmer of static. Every one only the glitter of glass. The dust of constellations, the whole of the galaxy waving a slight goodbye. We spin in such small circles, that we hardly move at all. There is no metaphor to this kind of lonely. There is only the measure and the mystery. There is only the dark and the cold.

close enough

Night wanders on in from the wings, the sun never finishing what it starts. You would call but you don't trust the number. You would write but the words get in the way. If anyone asks, I say I understand. If anyone asks, they are keeping it to themselves.

There is nothing to be done about it. I close my eyes, and you arrive. You gather like the slow slide of gravity, every victory just a matter of degree. You descend like the long draw of flight, every approach something like the hunt. Like some comet I burn as bright as you are near.

Close enough, you never complain. Close enough, the blood does all the work. Matter whispers its secrets, like finds like again and again. We all draw nearer, distance hidden behind our backs. These fecund galaxies amalgamate around the void of collapsed stars, and so all speed away from one another. Gravity just a confluence of small aches and ceaseless wantings. Destiny always just where you would hope.

with me

I want you here, when the world burns down. I want you there with me at the end of days. The one regret, the unanswered question. That claiming kiss, those fiery eyes, the peak and the fury of your graceful blessed flesh. To follow the last light into the horizon. To close the door and throw away every key.

The first bite is bitter, but I go ahead and swallow. I learned to take the dish as placed long before you lost me for good. These deep years have taught me to savor the seasons when all the seasoning is spent. All the lessons I need I learn last. Fevered and fallen so hard and far that only I had never noticed. Lost so long that only I believed I had a path left to follow.

I no longer know what star to wish on. I no longer know when to quit the road. Waiting for a clue like I was praying for rain. Waiting for a calling like I ever answered straight. I want you the way our absences are almost always about to touch. So close only the sky is nearer. So far it may as well be a star. I want you like a hope for heaven. I want you close when all that distance burns.