Our Great Work

Books keep my secrets

Hushed scratch of pen

Kerosene flickering beside

These walls contain my blood

Ink and time

Sharp lines form intent

I add more resin to the charcoal

Smoke curling as blood ignites

I stop a moment

Tip tapping something

Typewriter slap clack bright

Words powerful enough to bend

Maybe break something too

The universe reverberates

Down into my bones

A silk hand rests upon my shoulder

Beak clacks

Antlers brush the air above

Our work is right

And good

 

It is necessary

Therefore

It is possible

Awaken

Night gives over to brilliant day

Blinding effluent rays

Spilling down her every curve

Whispered good mornings

I offer something different

To my torpid goddess

Still wiping sleep from eyes

A simple breakfast

And cup of coffee

She smiles, covering face

“You’re too kind…”

I know all too well

As soon as food is forgotten

We shall fall into one another

Tumult and passion

Again

And again

And again

Update Required

The buzzing started weeks ago

An update claiming upgrades

“To quality of life”

My eyes swam with words

End User Agreement

And several hundred paragraphs

I brushed them aside

Progress bar began

Several hours later

A warning appeared

“USER BELOW PRODUCTIVITY THRESHOLD”

Then the buzzing began

Three words flashing over and over

“Return to Work”

I am crippled from the waist down

I am only qualified for physical labor

But I cannot afford cybernetics

Beyond the state mandated

Citizen OS

I feel nauseous…

I just want it to end

For quiet

For rest

A Forest’s Son

Allways

Waiting

Breathless here, now.

Then too

Past reaching out

Fingers outstretched

 

This Möbius strip coiling within

Ouroboros

Back into my past

Coming back faster than reason

Breaking through the surface

 

Waiting for someone

Bark breaks and bows bend

Trees part as I pass

Eyes scan wooded horizon

Slivers of distance

A million splintered dreams

 

Give to me now

She who waits

Rushing back

Faster than fate

Distance crushed in an instant

 

The forest cradles her

As I cradle her

The smell of green fills the air

Life returns

I breath again

Gods of the Forest

The woods give to me

Bow branches low

Eager to cradle

I am thrill and hush

What wild has allways meant

Fang and fur

And fiery eyes

Eager rushing hushing run

Seeking the next rend

Brilliant crimson flow

Faintest splash nearby

Leap from the riverbed

I am joined by Her

Head low and stealth

Quiet as death

She moves to lead

And I follow soundlessly

Together we will satiate

That which allways hungers

Coda

Sun leans over top

Squinting down at me

Why up so early?

The hubbub of the office drones

Hurriedly driving to work

Behind me now

Library closed

But for half an hour more

I’ll wait

Patiently

Patience is a virtue

Is a cliché

Tap tip tap

Spell out my experience

Poetic wordistry

But simple scene

Leaves me worrying

This is all quite drab

But interspersed here

Brief words interchanged

‘Tween me

And my fated love

This makes it all

Worth the wait

Fate

The universe churns

Chaos incarnate

Swirling shift-thickening cosmos

Yet here two souls

Two lone broken things

Are pushed together

Found amongst the billions of others

And they dance

Their essence swirling in time

In sync strangely

They scarcely believe it

How could it be?

Yet

Again and again

The universe tells them

“This must be.”

And so they dance

Onward

Together

Thematic Schematic

Home as horror

Bones to wood

Flesh to paint

Muscle to drywall

A living thing

And we

Parasitic vermin

What then

If this body

Developed cancer

Hallways to nowhere

Living rooms extending forever

A kitchen in a kitchenette in a shower

Expanding confounding extrapolating heuristic terror

Quotidian walls warped beyond reason beyond meaning becoming meaning

Home as horror