Wednesday, October 18, 2006

If this one's too long for you, you can read the poem before this one.

Purged

Sickness can make life far better—

the delirious half-dreams,

rolling and tumbling through black clouds

in restless sleep,

senseless, short cycles

sure to repeat,

rolling and tumbling through black clouds

bound to repeat

again;

but then,

 in mid-cycle, I roll out of the shroud

that flaps against my face in the wind from my fan.

A long, trembling finger, from the sea of my stomach

has risen

as if from memory, from myth,

risen from the dead,

to remind me what it's like to be a terrified child.

Into the bathroom—a click and I'm painfully blind.

The slender finger slides and presses higher,

up to the edge of my throat,

it pushes a button on the back of my tongue

that sends helplessness tingling to the tips of my fingers.

The jolt is relayed and echoes back to my mouth,

the final pulse—a quiver of my bottom lip—the height of the fear

before memory is ripped out, seared and branded anew,

and tucked back into a mildewing grave.

The convulsions in my throat pull past my stomach, as low down as my groin,

wringing out a meal from at least twelve hours back…

and they continue several times before realizing that nothing more is coming out,

except thick spit, gasps and moans.

Defeated, back in my bed, I can cling to the hope

that this night's war for rest is over,

but I am welcomed back by taunts and rhythmic nonsense—

pointless sleep and nausea—delirium.

When I wake, the sick feeling is lying there with me.

When I stand, it drops and hangs, stretching and straining my stomach,

anchored remorselessly somewhere inside my forehead;

and it hangs there all day; and follows me to bed another night.

And it claims another 24 hours after that.

And it's here, on the third day of this illness, that I see how good life is:

the ability to walk with light feet, to lean against my backpack on the grass,

to breathe deep, to work, to laugh…and then to have rest after it all.

With all that taken away, after just three days I know what it's worth to me.

No doubts, fears, worries—just a simple desire to live.

It's hard to hurt but a joy to heal.

Busy Sidewalk (tentative title)

The man on his motorcycle

props it up with one leg,

holds his whole back straight,

surveys the busy sidewalk,

and lets the engine rumble.

The girl on the damp, wooden bench

slides and shifts her legs,

one propped over the other;

she looks at no one,

and twirls her curled hair on a finger.

A crow on the streetlight,

shuffles on two thin legs,

opens his mouth first,

surveys the busy sidewalk,

and lets forth his call.

The pine tree over the wooden bench

sways on her single leg,

waves her pollen fingers,

looks at no one,

and, silently, lets the cones fall.

(They're all the same.)

(^tentative last line)