Old Growth

When will it be daylight again?

When will the people not suffer,

And flights of whimsy replace politics

How I long for those days

Of non-commitment,

Of finding sunlit paths to follow –

Absolutely everything is arguable

Those brave tenets of truths no longer

Foursquare

But teetering like a 3-leg stool, with one short leg –

The constant rocking both annoying & uncertain

When all I see is one fact to bind the rest

Now, not immobility by any means

Not the way of the warrior

Nor the happy gardener

But someone who bakes crusty bread

To break with equal friends

Maybe a strong cheese nearby

Knots are not my specialty

I’m a bit lost at this social skills thing

Social media is not a grace but a bulling-board

Bugling & ringing, discordant

Disagreeing, disappointing, dulling

Unnecessary

I don’t need to know what others think

I have my own thoughts to live through

My own opinions to fry or fly

And besides, I’m hungry for breakfast

Tho my friends sleep in, sleep on.

The wind becomes constant, steady

One discordant gust

I see no trees bending

I hear no leaves rubbing one another

There is just wind.

This is not “normal”

This is an unfinished thought of God

The destruction of the old, a flicking at the new

In an old motel with

Water running somewhere in the wall

Shall I leave now? On the cusp of a midnight awakening?

A random pain bringing consciousness

No coffee in the room,

Wearing a cashmere shawl over flowered pajamas

Made for summer

I have cold water & cheese

I want neither

I have nuts I cannot chew

Without the binding of artificial teeth

There is only darkness awaiting

Ignition.

Is this the change of the world?

I finished The Way by Cormack McCarthy

A sad book ending on a  hope of a future

A small boy lost to powerlessness

To mistrust: so sad, so true

A powerful irony to read this on the night the world ends

A seething moving behind the scrim

Of green just behind.

Like a small animal, I want to flee

I want to hold still; become invisible

Who wants to surf the world’s demise

In a Red Roof Inn beside an empty highway?

Is there a choice in the matter?

When the end is nigh, as the signs say

Bobbing & weaving in some crowd somewhere

An underline to the event – a faint angel

On the horizon, fanning wings aglow

Ready to swoop, to soar, to ride Change

As an avenger to endings –

Will she turn this inside out?

Bring sunlight behind,

A morning at 1 a.m.?

She fades to black, underlining

Not so much hopelessness as despair

Entire.

Even as I realize this cannot matter

For life always rules out death

In all its forms.

I knew this trip would change me

I made no predictions beyond that

We agreed we would not return to there

My friend continued home – four more hours’ driving

I timed out, eyes blurring under an unblinking west-sky sun

I want to be home. I want hot water for coffee.

I want my life to be painless again, not pointless

Except in its continuity.

I want more commas, fewer periods

No more full stops.

I have a rumbling feeling

It is time to go

Without looking behind

A bone of knowing

Stuck in my throat

Undissolved.