them dead

 

them dead

 

it’s hard to think of them dead

when there’s always been that absence

the excuses of time and distance

they’re still not here in the same way

living in that part of the mind that does not

mind yet lingers constantly on its own innocence

that part of the mind where no one really ages

and the futures always there   waiting   undelivered

the book’s unturned pages where

you’ve been living since you were seventeen

or so   no matter what the mirror suggests

the incremental stages of departure unseen

unnamed     uncalled

the symptoms of a disease that do not manifest

yet are slowly killing you all

the same

so, harder still to think of yourself dead

unspared

outside of the endgame  

of the wood

 

of the wood

the daylight shelters here for the night

amongst the trees builds its nest snuggles

up to the roots rolls in the moss the mulch

disguised as darkness as a place not

not a time we travel through the moon

snagged in the drift net of branches struggles

to escape flees beneath the clouds going

nowhere west a softness underfoot a fox

a badger a nocturnal creature a sudden

crack of tinder a small voice made large

and loud the noises come here too to change

their shape to bend and stretch to imitate

and intimidate the silence that itself feels

uncomfortable and broken wishing for

morning mourning like birdsong in the dawn

daylight retreating leaving shadows brushstrokes

of itself streaks amongst the leaves light rising

slurred a drunk on his way home lurching on un

even ground dreaming of words that could …

but stumbling he can’t see the trees for the would