Four Hours

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Four Hours

 

 

Four cold hours

far from dawn

I sit in

manipulated darkness

waiting to see

what will come lie down in

this coffin of a moment,

 

thieving the spray of rosemary from my hand.

 

I've followed

the spark

all my life

seen it birth and kindle

seen it flicker deep

in eyes dark-sweet as berries

when all other light

 

was taken

 

but there is

nothing in this roving 

black behind the blindfold tonight

not a single reflection glancing bright

off the book of stone; only that absence

which is the certainty of death

its witchlight capricious as hope

 

with no thing fair about it.

 

Why have you

brought me here now

to such circular endings, to

this museum of

stolen seeds, false gods, burned

fields, raped children?

Four hours cold

hold too much

 

too many graves

too much

silence.

 

 

 

November 10 2024 

 

 

posted for Word Garden Word List

at Shay's Word Garden

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Note: This includes words from both this word list and the previous one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Black Bowl, 1907  © George Seeley   Public Domain

Curse the Darkness, ©Thomas Dodd  Fair Use

At The Hospital

 

 

 

 

 At The Hospital

 

 

Pendants of light

reflections reversed

bent on slick white tile

random voices

in chained rooms

living out their untold

fortunes. Are fortunes told

or are they read,

written in a book of days

all numbered

not visible except

through curving crystal?

Or are they droned

the same tune every time

inside the skull,

mortality's earworms?

I am indifferent.

The gypsy broke my cup;

my tea leaves spilled.

 

 

 

 

circa 2019, rev. March 2022 

posted for earthweal's

Open Link #131

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Sun In An Empty Room, 1963, © Edward Hopper   Fair Use

The Fortune Teller, 1933, © Brassai            Fair Use 

Advice From The Fortune Teller

 

 

 

Advice From The Fortune Teller

 

 

"Look up to jump," the gypsy calls.

"It's how you fly instead of fall.

It's a long way down, that last bump,

so fly your eyes like starlings brawl.

That's how you miss the awkward thump,"

the gypsy calls."Look up to jump."

She's jumped before. I try to trust

my heavy wings of wax and rust,

the sky my boat, the wind my oar,

my feathers eyes above earth's crust

cast floating up and sent to soar.

I try to trust. She's jumped before.

But then I see she smiles and smiles

at birds stitched high on cloudy miles

at knifing rocks that slice the sea,

carving waves like bladed turnstiles.

"Just look up and finally be free."

She smiles and smiles, but then I see.

February 2022

posted for dVerse Poets

Poetry Form: Sparrowlet

(for a complete description of this quirky little form, see above, where Grace is hosting)

Images ; The Fortune Tellar, 1933, © Brassai   Fair Use

Floating Woman, photomanipulation © Phillip Igumnov  Fair Use