I wrote this last month, i really ought to revise it and try to turn it into something a bit more readable, i liked the concept
~
I can't wash you off my skin
your scent persists, even after I bathe
the ablution I seek melds it to me, rather than washing it from me
such is a cleansing in and of itself, through it does chaff my skin, writing tiny scars beneath the surface
I have many such scars, and I wear them without concern
In the distance, winking out of sight, stand a mother and child
not my mother, nor my child
I bid them farewell, but will raise my hand only to bless my brow
My head does not incline even though I stand among the rocks of the dead, such is more respects than I can pay anymore
she thought she had the moon, but the moon moves daily and the moon moves alone
though it's movements are eternally tied to the Earth
Once broken, I am whole again but you, you are only stone
The hammer slips from my hand to join the chisel that is lost amid the weeds, was lost long ago
I feel need no need to bless them and my hands are strong in their absence
your smile hangs hauntingly, the crescent in my sky
Your lips, eternally split but endlessly unmoving, I stand before a visage of an old life's fear
such bliss, years of anticipation
can you be she? Before you answer consider this:
Can you answer a five-year-old's prayer?
Uttered every night ad infinitum to the window and the rug and the smiling face above him
though the white wind roars betwixt the eaves and the bricks inside my heart is feeling the dew turn to vapor, passed swiftly to my lungs and out again
this sudden spring, can such be such as was always sought?
I know your stair and am glad it is neither wide nor white, but should I turn? My path is long and I have already climbed many such staircases and all have crumbled under my bare feet,
but such was their ruin not mine,
I fear only graveyards and the peace that can be found in their soil
soil not fit for the orchard
I know your door, open to my feet or closed to my face, I have seen such and recognize them
Neither gives me pause, I cringe only at staircases
even though they cannot harm me
when the petals start to split, you forget what the bloom smelled like
I have never seen the face of my mother,
not in the garden nor the pools nor the reflections kept within
If I met her would I recognize?
I think not, but what is a the tree to the fruit, once it has fallen?
the man cares not for the heckling of his brothers
he shakes inside a firm shoulders, squared against that which life is giving him.
He is not I, but I am he, at least in part
but not much
not much at all
Has the mender come? Are you she or does she come yet? Where is your needle?
I was told she would be as milk but I find only salt water in this cup
this chalice perhaps,but fit for water alone
I have lost my taste for wine
I note the scale, and the gambler's smile, I've left more on his plate than I had thought
Like an old magic trick, my hand not my own I fetch another from my pocket and throw it to this hound
he is a wolf, I will say such plainly,
Even his canines are clean
A house divided cannot stand, even a house such as this
match my coin til the timbers fall
if your pockets are deep enough
lie in my arms, reap
reap until the fruit finds your basket or falls by the roadside
among the thorns
It only only through reaping, of fruit and wheat and health, that such can be lost or gained
you must take to the field
the fire has gone out in the home and kitchen is empty of all but dust.
Dust to dust
until dust
dust no more
I feed my mouth fresh fruit, wishing to feed yours. To nourish you, heal you inside
to smell your salts and rinse them away with that which was born in the sun, born on the vine, born on the tree, born in the field, born in the dust, born.
Take this, or leave it, the reaping season has come, and it is spring
even if such a quiet voice as this implores:
“please fly wild
please fall from grace
turn your stair white
tell me God is not so cruel
as to offer fruit so red
a natural heart
whose veiled insides hold only a hungry decadence
a purgatorial feast
silence the cacophony that echoes across this chapel, silence it or I will
and tell me, please,
that God is not so cruel”
Is fear to be forsaken completely?
If your limbs heal and grow strong
and your wounds turn to ever-fading scars
do you wait with less anticipation for the scratch on the roof of your mouth to pass?
We are fruit, fruit with skin, skin foremost, I think
I am no martyr, I long ago learned the life of the pilgrim
I chose it, or it was chosen for me, but I bear it ineffably, my tongue still even here
My life is no fire, for fire can be smothered, but I can flicker, I can wane in the chillest winds of this journey
but I am no fire, and I am no martyr
a pilgrim, if ever there was such more devoted to his path
so it was in my beginning and shall be in my end, but the shrine I seek shall be overtaken or my bones shall lie amid the crows and rooks
one skeletal limb extended, pointing the way
I will enter the chapel drink your wine and eat at your table
In this life or the next, so shall it be
and such prayers shall stand silent sentinel
til I cast open the door with no stair before it
Home 
