Shieldwall

An iron wall

built into my shoulder

to bind the sinew to the bone,

the viscera to the meat.

One of metal, of plate, of screw

to deflect javelins of words

spears of intent:

the weapons women wield.

Deep below the surface of flesh

lying between riven bone,

socketed steel

the wound festers, grows fevered

sending electrical tendrils of warning:

the barrier fails.

A lodestone of iron

forged from the iron wall

charged powerfully, woefully

by the currents of nerves, neurons

swarming through my body:

I am aligned to her

as moon to earth.

She has but to unseal slow-strung lips

permit scant few words to flow

for the shield to fall

and I to fail.

Cell Phones

I walk far from the vocal spigot

bolt-lever fastened and secure

move forward, away in haste

in the belief that time traversed

correlated

with her voice erupting

breaking haphazard safety seals.

Falling like a fountain in my absence

her words come to strike the ground

dissolving rapidly, churning dirt to mud

splashing filth into my footprints

the sound of her jarring,

drowning my thoughts from afar.

Sprinting maddened and fevered,

I dive long and deep

in desperate bid to swallow the delgue,

to take it all within me

but the taste is wrong;

flat, sweet where was expected bitter, bubbly.

It dawns on me then

that though the name is the same

the wrong Sara has spoken.

Low Stakes for High Yields

She's throwing her face of need

all aglow and hopeful

begging victimhood.

Imagining nobody notices

eyes-wide, downturn

pulling photons from the floor

grasping at ancient, shattered pieces.

Oh, but he's an old hand at this

senses, by design, adept at this

scented fertile fields

heard her long before she spoke.

Yet anew she'll try again

caution uplifted

not as bastion,

but seed cast to the wind.

Scattering

hoping they'll grow in boughs 'round her

to deflect the worst of him.

Oh, but he's an old hand at this

a product of generations perfecting tools for this:

whether by axe, by rake or by hoe

he knew her path long before its growth.

She looks upon him now

strutting about her blasted field

offering token, vague resistance

before yielding

like the crop he knew her to be.

Helias

She came as does morning

radiant and becoming in introduction

illuminating

flaws, goals, underlying structure

By high noon there was clarity

visions possible only at deep night

stirred into being by her apex.

Dusk, though long of shadow,

held comfort of embrace

of held hands

solidarity of mutual purpose

red-ringed

by veiled anger.

As the night came

she was gone.

Suns

Hair explainable, perhaps only attainable,

via jagged electric lines from the sky

yet eyes follow, shimmer greengoldenbrown

with none of storm's lined chaos, no,

but maybe focused-inflicted madness

as

they

settle straight-on, brightened above wide-eyed

smile

-something new, there,

shattered-glass that's mended fast

upturned hopes but sails at half-mast.

Bicycle Murder

Boredom churns broad-in-brain

competing with petty volumes of alcohol

(white Russian, 1, Magic Hat #9, 1)

for dominance of the summer's eve.

Unsure of which would prove the victor,

past-tense, too, filled with unknowing:

thought- and pedaling-process interrupted

by a traitorous bicycle;

a forward-bent-fork;

a fleeing, unbolted forwardwheel.

Fast-pitch forward,

eyes-wide but dead:

quickfall into void.

Then, wide-eyed horror:

awake again

filled with the horrible pain of life again

fueled, amplified tenfold

through the impact of the sidewalk.

East Side at Sunset

Low-rise light commercial blocks

obscure the horizon,

making the sky seem small.

Patchy, steel-on-violet

cloud canopy is gripped,

dragged horizontal,

catching beams of sunlight

scattering them

in a thousand different directions

of only one color.

Mid-April

unexpected goldburst of a cold sunset,

come too late:

soon, fall will arrive.

A sun so low,

squat buildings raised so high

that shadowed cast are long,

and the days short.