Unfinished

~ thesecretplacesofsparrows ~ Leave a comment

I have found my history
scrawled in a notebook.
Morning errands, a reading list, a love letter.
Phone numbers no longer in service.

Years have passed.
A man shifts faintly
in memory.
We pressed into eachother
as the streets went quiet and dark.

No longer do I sit in front of
that apartment window
watching smoke rise from the rooftops
or answer the phone late at night, saying “yes”.

Lives take on the weight of mystery.
A simple list is something to be excavated,
catalogued and deciphered.
Old pages, old habits, old and other selves.
Our memories are not our own.

 

 

Winter

~ thesecretplacesofsparrows ~ Leave a comment

I saw the snow breathe
in this otherworld of silence where
ghosts move within the cloaks of animals,
light footed and careful.

I was afraid to step further,
afraid the snow would cry out
or the sparrows would rise furiously
from their secret places.

Tired farmhouses, their lights dimming,
and memory like weathered bone
can crack to pieces
like ornaments in wind.

 

Bring out the dead

~ thesecretplacesofsparrows ~ Leave a comment

Neruda. En La Memoria
In honor of Solo la Muerte

Your purple river lures you quietly with watery
hands stained with crushed violets.
Curling fingers of wet leaves find the pooling
hollows of your heart. You look to the trees,
to the rush of birds overhead.
How do you greet your admiral?
Extend a hand, bow gracefully as the river turns.
Dark behind you.

Night

~ thesecretplacesofsparrows ~ Leave a comment

The acorns and chestnuts are falling. A train bellows along the river and I feel the hot air of summer sink lower, take on weight like a damp cloth, cling to old bones and old habits with familiar comfort. My heart has taken a turn for the better. It is seemingly less likely to explode and friends take another year. We drink cheap beer, smoke cigarettes and sit comfortably with new songs in the same room we have shared for nearly a decade. Outside the world is shifting, lovers spark blue in the night like matches and I sit alone on the porch with the moon and insects and autumn settling into the mountains. The dead will be coming soon for their apples and marigolds. Light the lanterns. I want to lay naked in the river at night with moon and rock and old water one last time before we freeze into the landscape of our fading selves. We take on ghosts as our hearts crack and scab over.