Free Verse

Everything now is sacred: Ambivalence;
A traveling troubadour troupe
Holding tongues of fire and gospels
Of white lilies in their hair;
The weathered logs of antiquity’s past,
Flowered over with rhinestone buttons
Of discolored saplings;
A shuffle of static rustle through the tree branches
As a visible treachery is shattered
And veritably missed;
An extremity newly cleansed with water
And wreaking of peppermint soap;
The sunset blooming like flower petals
Over the encroaching skyline of
Pizzerias and bank tellers;
The waves of laughter in quiet tones;
The flaming colors of blinded followers;
A hand to hold with trust down the hill.

A meandering grasp grabs, grapples through the darkness
Of trees surrounding and blinders secure.
A gentle hand to guide or beguile
Moves over the soft arms of questioning.
The squeals of tires and excitement
Fill the air with joy and odors of candor
As the blinds stay closed
On the trusting faces that entreat the silent darkness
For but a moment’s light.
They are entangled in an embrace
Of tree branches and shoulders and hair.
They are breathing the scent
Of insecurity and laughter,
And they stare blankly ahead with uncertainty,
Awaiting a quiet fate or a bang or whisper.

Everything now is clothed, bathed in poignancy.
Everything cries out its uncertain importance.
The noonday rises as the moon fades
And the knowing travelers welcome the uncertainty
With arms outstretched.
A fragment calls out from the edge of the wood
To remember the plucked lilies and peppermint
And the sensation of newly washed feet in the darkness.

May 10, 2007