A crimson tinted mouth smudges
comrade glasses beneath a buzz of
walking suits. They talk only amongst
themselves, never to her.
Glittering gown masks avian limbs, a
former gazelle turned silent sidekick.
She is hopeless in her new-found role
and recites alphabetic antiphons, reaping
no harvest beside such diseased plantings,
yet brightly standing still, she will.
Decay of the visible is difficult enough but the
assassination of the unseen is a far greater crime.
Amazing transformations are taking place every day and
already, we have lost precious and valuable slivers of
energy that could have been used in an
alternate life. The disintegration of our histories is a
puzzle that we may never be able to solve.
Symbolic objects pass through weathered hands, forever
edited for meaning by time’s ever-changing whims.
Advertisements plastered on your front door (again). An
animal—possibly a cat or a female child—howls from outside; your
bonus for residing in a drab and dilapidated district.
Conifer trees lined up in rows like luckless soldiers wait for collection. Which
gene programmed you for this existence? In the
inglenook a solitary Christmas card is taped to the wall…a
shot of humanity from an old high school friend.
Spaghetti for dinner (again).
sundry folly 