The River of Eras

-


Surely, there lies an immanent core

anchored somewhere in this chasm?

It swells through roiling hills and vales;

a ravine veils the riverbed’s repose.


But Eros conspires with the Fates,

hurling me headlong through rapids—

lovers surge in turbulent throes,

and somehow, blindsided by a precipice—


I plunge,

    limbs flailing,

        into the throat of Styx.


What’s the point of being prized

a rare pearl amidst the silt,

then pulverised on a whim—devalued:

sham nacre, stripped of lustre?


If love is a river, let it be known:

I am ravaged by your torrents.

Intensity is the counterfeit of love;

an undertow that never quenches.


So bathe me in gentle streams: Everglades.

And if my love takes eras to cascade,

at least she’ll run clear,

winnowed through cypress knees—


a quiet bedrock,

unyielding.





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

My Ancestor’s Daughter

-
Image
Foreign gods, foreign lands, ancient creatures, ancient men, alien palms, alien eyes — spread out, melted: a knob of butter pools on the kitchen counter. The ghost of my grandmother’s grandmother gathers, peels, smothers, bends — a whole life pressed between foreign bodies; makes her bed in the pigpen. Would love be so kind as to kiss that damned, haunted thing? Eyes bulging, shark teeth gleaming, crawling  by my bedside. Her shackles rasped for centuries; her chains scrape my cheeks. Better to drag me to the nether coven with her than to ever let me be free. If she survived by kissing soiled feet, anointed first in chains, do I have the right to pry the bedrock — the very prison that once crowned her most beautiful wretch, most beloved concubine? I love you, but I can’t ever be you. To save us, I’ll have to let this bloodline die. So I pry. The bedrock sheds like old skin,  revealing a tender pulse: my grandmother’s, then mine (keeps time). I unravel a single thread from your...
Read more

Letters Unsent

-
Image
When will your letters unseal, unfurl— from knitted bud into emblazoned meadows, azaleas resplendent, ascending, their lifeblood running wild through root-stream? When will moon rivers meander, then sunder from placid waters that veil spry creatures— into sunburst rays that spark and flay hidden embers in the bare light of day? Still, this heavy love chafes against your ribs, cloaks its face from the moonlight of your soul. You prune away shadow, those  mourning glory  sisters, damp tendrils entwining your heart-guarding gazebo. Yet the orb of oblivion will always return— from crescent, gibbous, to full bloom. And when the tides swell under the grand plenilune, truth, at last, breaks water. Engulfing the inlet, unearthed, unholy feelings surge into the wild unknown. So— where will your letters unseal, unfurl? Amidst the juniper berries of sleepy January, the almond blossoms of April’s awakening, or the blooming jewels of June? Could your letters at last break seal, unfurl in t...
Read more

Forsaken by the Moon

-
Image
Does the river feel the weight of its banks, or the clover bed sense night folding in? If the mockingbird sings a requiem beneath the moon, perhaps this heart could learn to cleave the cord that’s bound to you. Forsaken by the moon— that cold, wavering crescent, a lantern flickering false, casting echoes of fractured vows. Lies upon lies: a gale gnarling branches, a snare of tangled twine, mist that smothers rivulets. I hate that I love you. I love that I hate you. If hate could bury love, the death knell would have rung— long before the sun could swallow the moon.
Read more