Another
One skin may hide another,
I remember this from a poem when I
launched a fire across a field of deadness.
At least, to me, it seemed dead.
I felt like a liberator of life force
renewing the blistered and dying grasses.
Actually, more weeds than grass,
but nonetheless, the flora had flat-lined.
I peeled back skin with holy flame
and brought everything to black again
as though I called the night to descend.
From blackness will arise a new skin
cresting green architecture from a fertile void.
As the flames spread their inviolable enchantment
I saw your face spreading across my mind.
Remember the fire we held?
I hoped it would unfurl a new skin
for us as well.
I still hold this hope.
Forever it will roam inside me
invariant to all transformations and motions.
One person may hide another,
but behind you, love is molting a thicker skin
than I can see through.
No flame can touch its center.
No eyes can browse its memory.
I want nothing behind you in wait.
Seconds tick away like children growing
in between photographs.
I will not forget you in the changes.
Cursed with memory so fine
I can trace your palm.
I can inhale your sweet breath.
I can linger in your arms' weight.
I can hear your exquisite voice
calibrate life with celestial precision.
One purpose may hide another.
I heard this as the fire died out
to reveal the scent of the wet earth
and growing things.
I could feel my love decompose
returning to the uninhabited realm
where it belongs.
Where all hearts belong when
love is lost, and the code of the mute,
coiled in fists that pound,
reveal the wisdom of another.
Life Carriers
Life carriers spawn in the primal waters
of a giant embryo.
Their progeny will settle in human dust.
Pieces of clay
with tiny thoughts of flight.
Knife-points veiled in turbid cloaks
that shun the light of a tranquil star.
In the remote wilds the life carriers
emerge and perch upon
the shoulders of gray stones.
They signal their desires to fly,
but their homes are suited
for the comforts of rain and earth.
The sky must wait.
(The dirt companion smiles.)
Circles break.
Barriers overrun.
Life carriers deny their ancient pull
from the ground.
Wings sprout like golden hair
sinuous with nature's artifice.
Ragged feet are left behind.
The earth replaced with vivid sky.
Gravity shines its menacing stare
to hold them
with assertive hands.
Homeless cages
are left to rot.
To sink behind the groundless sky.
Earthen faces have dropped their smiles
and lost their smell of fresh dirt.
The dream of flight
has invaded somber walls--
life carriers have bounded
to the other side.
There they meet the next rung
of the endless ladder,
and trade their wings for wisdom's eye.
