It flowed beyond us, through our hands
playing past our ears,
digging trenches in the lands.
Passing by us, all our years,
or sitting there like ducks,
it ebbs and passes by.
through the night it snuck,
always more than meets the eye.
From those who stood,
just further up the banks,
winding through the fields and wood,
by scenery ever flanked.
We watched it tumble past us,
with the softest sound,
the world has been its canvas,
with swirls and whirls it wound.
And like a world-wide tradition,
it visits everyone.
And the switch is flipped off
even after the switch is flipped there is just a fragment of time when a lightbulb will hum and shine and light will dance on the wires.
and there is still a moment after there is a stillness in breath and beat when glimmering, scared eyes still see.
But maybe those eyes never stop seeing, and they watch as everything fades away from them. And they don't stop seeing in the blackness, the blackness is simply what they see.
That is, before the light.
Because any switch is a flipped switch, a light that is turned off is off by choice, and is still there.
And eyes do see the nothing that is something there, until the current dances away from the wires, and the lights that are flicked off can see that when they are on they dull the world around them.
And the switch flicks, and the world is brighter than before.
Sunday service
Her voice floats like a balloon,
rising to the ceiling of the church in which she sings on Sundays
It's still a quarter to noon
the midday sun sinks the streets in a heat-haze
ripples rise off the asphalt like steam
rising from the surface of a stew
that you slurp when you're sick between fever dreams
but no one in the building knew
their eyes were wandering all over
yet their ears picked up only the song
even wily children keep an air of composure
keeping still, although the hymn is long
the church is a building that sings the songs back
with it's high steepled ceiling of planks of wood
it echoes back perfect, though most of the wood is cracked
from settling, or the vast time this church has stood
the rows of pews force backs to attention
the straight up seats force a dignified posture
but we don't notice as we hold a breath of tension
not worrying of our backs nor the curvature
as the room fills to the brim with her voice
and as we sit we do think to ask
when she sings, do we have a choice?
her cry has never just slipped past
am I cruel for lying to a liar
A twisting blade is pushed into my back and I gasp
breath escapes me now and flutters out of reach
almost...
almost!
like a butterfly that simply
skips
just
far
enough
away
so that my desperate hands and my desperate lungs
both fall
just barely short
and I'm saying something,
and I'm wondering to myself what it is
maybe I'll never know
but I almost do and
it's almost a response to these words
that aren't mine, but for me
and I'm broken
never been more
b
r
o
k
e
n
except the blood brought by a blade is
fading fearsomely fast from
my mistaken, miserable mind and
I hear something I didn't want to hear because I know
It's the farthest thing from
and anything but
and absolutely not
true
and another twist from a blade buried deep in my back because I realize
what I'm saying is as blantantly untrue
and I'm a liar as well
and even more so
than who I'm listening to
because "It's okay"
is not the correct response to "I'm sorry"
when everything is definitely not okay.
But I stand and although I have been murdered,
absolutely obliterated, and I catch the butterfly breath because I am a liar
I do what my killer does not expect,
and wouldn't dare to yet hope from me.
I give a smile with my words