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From chapter two:
What Becomes of Flesh and Love
Time only consumes youth.
Nothing more...
From sweatshirt days to glassy beaches,
We traverse ever so silently to the end.
I loved long ago.
Inside of your hand was the tiniest of memories.
A flicker of pain and compassion.
From strange islands to surrounded states you traversed.
Your halo apparent to all and your step light.
I loved you long ago.
Overseas the wind comes faster, more swiftly,
And more feminine than we know here.
It has a hand to swoop under your coat, up your skirt,
And through your hair.
You had shaved your head before departing to negate
The chances of catching lice.
Your halo more apparent.
These bodies surrounded you...
Some lying down and others vertical,
Everyone a smile and everyone a sinner.
Those eyes pulled tight always looked sly-
Always ready to catch your weakness
As easily as flies to blue light.
Years later you came home preaching only
To drink your share by the lake and
Take your pants off while I slept.
You left before 7:00 am.
I juggled thoughts like sawblades until
The TV pushed my head back in the pillow.
I had created a halo of my own this morning.
As far as time is concerned, it waits for no one,
Not even Jesus I'm afraid.
It waits for no love, no flesh-
Not even a planet.
But I waited.
I sat up at night with pen and paper,
Composing thoughts and images of you because
I was too tired to paint.
I waited on you to call me-
The telephone a booming voice from above,
Mail was a piece of your hands.
At least I was in your head.
Always in your head, the back of it, looming
Like a shadow in the wardrobe.
What becomes of flesh is strange. Time molds flesh
Like jack-o-lanterns months after festivities and
Changes grins to nursing mouths-
But time never conquers love-
We conquer love, or keep the tiniest pieces of it
Surrounded by the skin in our hands.
Letting go of it by choice, not reason.
From chapter one:
When Graveyards Held the Canopy of My Youth
When graveyards held the canopy of my youth,
When imaginary girls sprung forth from the ivy
With their black hair and robes,
When my radio was a magic box among the headstones-
I knew each name and could
Recite them twice
In the same order.
My old leaf-raking blanket
And a pocket of brown incense
Came along with a package
Of cheap smokes-
I would push play to beckon
These spirits with
Kate Bush and Siouxsie Sioux-
Smoke pulling up up up
Into a windless sky-
Mosquitoes like kamakazis
While the sun and the moon
Fought over who owned the horizon-
Two giant pine trees were witch's hats
And red carnations punctuated
The eyes of the dead.
They grew wild in this graveyard
Which had been forgotten,
Like photos or friends,
It could be rediscovered...
Their names recarved into
Minds other than my own
And hands green stained from
Pulling back the choking weeds
To help the stones breathe.
On Edith's grave there were
Two sheep and only one date,
October 8th, 1907,
Unless the other was far under the ground with her.
I would study her cherub face
In my head,
Smoking until my fingers were
As yellow as goldenrod,
And until the stars twinkled
Like ships on far-off waters.
Sometimes with magic wings
She would dare to float nearby-
Her countenance a wispy white
And wings not feathered, but veined,
And by the music's rolling and tumbling
She would move like a lantern
Back into the woods.
And maybe it was the smoke
Doing what it would on the absent wind.
Just me and the coming of night.
And perhaps the wind did become alive
So my recital of the names would carry
Forth on zephyrs to other places
Long forgotten-
Maybe caves whose open mouths
Scream for warmth
Or maybe hollowed trees whose
Holes hold no owls
Or maybe the cars that crawled slowly,
Far down the hillside, silently,
With their headlights illuminating
The fields of summer.
They were only fireflies from the distance.
And maybe with the names
On the stones
An energy would be created
By a young boy
In blond aura
And magical song,
That would bring remembrance
To a graveyard that held the canopy of my youth.
Perhaps I'm still there in the grass,
Touching the stones,
Kissing faces I have not seen.
And maybe they carry my childhood
To a place the living have forgotten.