Poetry eZine ~ April 2012

Monday, April 16

Nathan McDowell: We Were All

-bright eyed and thin shoed,
And you were all kahlua with your coffee,
grumbling at stacks of papers and grumbling
between the lines.
We were all falling, a felt tip pen
on your pillow when you woke -
half eternal burning hope,
half shoebox secret you never show your wife

We were all, Hey! watch out for the quivering
caress of some kind of crazy
anemone goddesses essence, yes.
You were all, excuse me, pardon me, with broad shoulders that
melted at the first sign of rain
and you were all, what’s that noise!
bright porch lights bake your last backstreet synapse.

We were all sleeping through the occasion, so you rose,
we were bright streaks of paisley falling through neighborhoods -
not as brave as our walk, and not so much aware of the fall, just
falling, falling, falling,

We stoodswayed, with a kinda chill I never learned to face
We stoneskipped, we let it be cold, and wet,
and dark over the Mississippi-train tracks,
and you curled into tiny folds of
dampened pride, set aside softly rotting.

We called you a coward, a self-flagellating Godhead.
We astral projected our sacred place into your secret place, but
your secrets lashed back, washing over us like Sunday morning shame.

Your ancient eyes looked too hard into us and
you said you weren’t afraid to die.
You said it with that crying kinda smile
and that made all the difference.

No comments:

Post a Comment