vernacular

We ride the tide of this ocean without sea or shore. We feel the brush of creation flying by, the throat only opened by the song, this press of breathless prayer unbound towards eternity. The scratch of the nub, the liquid shift of captured ink, until the click of fingers, unto this conspiracy of restless thumbs. The echo bears some slight enchantment of the life which it just so recently fled, the blush of that first reach, the ruffled feathers of this natal tongue. The choicest portions, the richest sops deluged at once by ancient appetites, the story all heady glut and starveling thoughts. The flocks that leave from sagging lines into ineffable flight, their shadows drawn dark and reluctant to the sky. The least intent a thousand fitful ripples.

The sun falls with its usual disregard, shadows slink and winds pace the rails. The sunlight climbing up the trees, the damp earth sodden with dusk. The lilt of song, the screech of tires and breeched traction light and silt through the senses vast transactions. That hint of a smile you always hear in her voice, that brightness of heart that her thought on eyes conveys, the depths of digression the flood of memories over these random skins. All the broken teeth and blown kisses buried far from the desert of my wind-worn ribs, the trails of secreted roots and lively flowers. Her own bones and breath the gorgeous foundry for this life renewed. All the wounds that can be carried, I will carry some more. The only oath that exists there in every breath.

I am a space between phrases. I am the trip of the tongue, not even a breath left to lose. The strange enchantment of dull technology leaving me to unwind in these long hallways behind your mind. Some cartoon haunted house complete with shifting wall and spinning bookcase, your mind a mystery machine to these slivers retained. Adrift in these rough constellations, the condensation of each sense to a few lithe strokes, the loosing of a resting ghost sealing your lungs and lips. You are there amid the masses, you reach and beckon entangled in my drift. You are here with-in the reach of speaking. You are here, with-in these shambled breathings, the cast of my blood on every shed word. Love as letters, a flag filled with wind.

bell-mare

Don't ask who cast this shadow, don't tell me what the sun should want. The reach of limb, the sweep of the sky. The weeping wounds that closed so long ago. This flesh infested with dreams and memories, the heavens surrendered to silhouette swallows and drowsy crows. The world fled its flesh and forever haunted ours, its songs resonating in our foolish throats, its will the folding of our slippery tongues. The trees sway and the rain descends to the brutal earth. The light goes, along with everything i ever thought was mine.

There is a ringing in every inference, slow circles walked in the cold and dark. Branches scratch at the windows and the storm holds court in the dizzying depths of the midnight sky. Somewhere there are voices, caught up in the lively wind. Somewhere there are reasons lighting inhuman eyes. The heart skips and scrapes with each percussive gasp, the walls ache and sigh with the weight of the falling wind. The old ways pace the earth while we speak aloud to our hopeful myths, always howling for some intercessor. These faiths of dull extinction coiling on our nervous tongues, these prayers that stick to teeth and ceilings. Belief a world burdened by words while the night keeps its own counsel.

The world turns, spilling rain and shadow. The world turns, its clockwork of boiling stone and hushed vapor ticking away amid these dead-eyed stars. I pace the floor, I trace the path the rain removed. These words seep through, the spells and invocations of the beaten heart and the bruised bones falling beneath my feet. The wild wings and the spent breath of beasts wasted on the confusion of thing and thought. The old ways and bitter warnings treated like fairy stories while we bow and scrape to the fables that endure. Our lives a foregone conclusion, everyone knowing how it is bound to end. The lucid chemistry of living enough to fill that broken cup, the self the meat on the map of knotted proteins and native grace. The wolf awaits, its skin the restless appetite and the focused wish. When the wolf is at the door, I don't break my stride. When the wolf is at the door I don't hesitate to let it in.