Arc

 

Afraid to move forward

Or retreat back
across the wreckage

this moment like shrapnel
scattered across the wasteland

our lives as a fraying banner  

begging for the rain to fall

as blossoms scattered to the wind

caustic and hurtful

the ache of what has been done echoing through us.

In the savagery of our species

Stripped of arousal

Where I don’t ever want to feel numb like this, numb to you.

Separated from what I feel and what I am  

Drawn and desiccated

Callous to our own suffering.

I open my eyes upon urban and domestic pantheon

In moments of solitude

Dissolving sexuality in a harshness I cannot place

I feel horrible—

I feel lost.

In the scent of something I relegate to memory

among caverns of corrosive darkness

How deeply we experience such moments

how often;

As chaos and carnage

Sought and sonder

Wish and wonder

a thin ribbon of smoke peels across this landscape

that chokes in sorrow 

asphyxiates in hurt

where you seem so impossibly far

in grief and strife  

how can we face the sun again

or each other  

unspeakable loss  

Wondering on that which will not become

in the clarifying bitter scent of redemption.