SOUTHnNORTH

waves crash against dark volcanic rocks. sand crabs scurry from their  holes to test the tide and draw themselves closer to the water’s edge.  the sun hits clouds after a downpour followed by an hour of interrupted radiance.  below the shining lights of worlds apart a cliff stands ninety degrees in the air jaggedly cut and weathered by the changing of seasons.  the surrounding greenery is not very green anymore - almost an arid brown gasping for whatever droplets of moisture it can gather. a slow warm wind drifts in landward the sender unknown.

in a bay we sit pace stumble gather chat descend rise circle plan.  my melting face briefly reforms after the salt coats it with a layer of protection after smacking against the waves.  the current is strong.  instead of being pulled out I find myself moving in back turned to the opening of the universe its teeth those rigid black rocks.

the night before i rolled in bed with madness scratching the soft skin on my cheeks.  yellow pus forming in the cracks and rolling down my chin.  redness around my eyes and lines dividing my features.  the fan clicking against the drapes and springs bouncing with my adjustments.  my bag is packed in the corner my shorts are folded in a small bag and a few notes are folded inside a pocket wrapped on the inside of a white shirt.

at the top of the hill a man pulls up in his truck and steps out to rip the roof off a newly built mansion.  a family of bats the only residents.  the metal frames around the windows have lines of rust painting the white exterior with premature decay.  the roof shows openings hastily sewn by roughly mixed cement. the crumblings of impulse eclipsing the foundations of clarity.

“OYE G______”

“What’s going on big man?”

“Just havin a look around.  Hey is that your piece of land in front of r________?”

“Naw, believe it’s the lawyer’s. J______ H_______ I think.”

“How’s yours coming along?”

“Not a whole lot.  Just working on this thing here.”

“Such a mess.  Sinking everything in to this.”

“Yeah and the inside is trashed.”

“Well, whatever, this is the year.  You see they got the road coming up?  Mayor’s office is gonna pay for like a few miles and the rest coming with the project.”

“For real?  They been talking bout this for the past five years.”

“It’s actually happening.  December is when they’re saying it’s going to be done.  I can feel it.  It’s that year.”

when the craters of the moon finally fill with the dust lost of millennia gone by.  when the cotton in my pillow floats out the broken seam through a window with a shutter ajar. when the wood in your chair collapses beneath your mass in to a thousand toothpicks to clean the gristle embedded in your gumline and that gristle reforms in to the movement of a cow in the pasture grazing on sodden grass.  while the water flows back from the faucet back in to treatment returning to a river running off the mountain high.  will it be all of us on a beach together contemplating laughing over the reason why?

dudes stalkin street corners with t-shirts slung over one shoulder blade steppin in to the middle of traffic stickin they hands in different directions flexin they muscles while the cathedral lights shine off the rearview mirrors of the passing toyota smell of garbage floatin lightly over the misty lake springin active volcanoes stirring molten lava on the inside patiently waiting for the next bubble to surface trees sway softly in fading summer breezes while the other world braces for a fall where we can slumber no more

when my only skill is to serve and protect

whether i’m on the last string 

chasing the ______ through the opening

straight lines giving way to tangled ones

knotted in several places 

all leading to the same spot

asked myself if it was a destination at all

where I finish where I start

it was a calm day and i decided to do something not all that unbecoming of me my personality and everything i try to embody year in year out day in day out hour in hour out second in…

she sat around a lot watched the things kind of come to her kind of make their way over in her direction while she sat not quite knowing who or what she was looking at.  it seemed like she knew somewhere deep down inside of her just not quite sure how it would find its way to the surface.  instead, she took some time drifting in some conversations asking a question or saying how she sort of felt. sometimes the topics were easy to recognize she could master those ones - talk about the way they made her want to go out and show everyone else why she was thinking about it in the first place or had an attraction to that in the meanwhile.  she found herself speaking over her voice listening to it echo across the firestation courtyard next to the old and still-in-service library.  she’d catch a few words there (either she’d say em, read em, or hear em) and try not act like she came across em in the first place.  that feeling she had where she’d just be staring at something and you know the images kind of can’t stick in any way no matter how you choose to insert em.  if she was readin she’d look at the sentence in a few different ways maybe repeat it out loud a few times give herself a context outside of the source n all that throw a different voice in the canister set that shit off in a scene of somesort.  or she’d be catchin a rhythm startin to let that shit speak you know relate a past story thought or almost feeling. almost felt that joinin on once again giving it that sinking motion putting it on the forefront of imaginations hereonout.  then a nother voice new voice muttered screamed blurted out something and all of a sudden she got all glued in to that one forgetting the forward swell on its way - finally, and beautifully on its way - and that was the last time she had that one because as soon as the sideways action moved in some sort of proximity it was like, ‘let me hang on to you for awhile gimme like a way to remember myself flickin rolls of rolls between my fingers making me forget those rolls had rolled or were rolling have been roll-aid since I rolled on this bench.’ and that voice be sounding all enthusiastic look whats going on over here betcha want in on it until you actually start finding out what it is that’s said and she’s like, ‘ooooohhhhhh that does sound like were getting somewhere but now what was it that I was goin with again?’ and then it’s like, ‘too late on that front you done have passed your way round this tree or engine on some sort of conveyor belt roughly like that.’ a moment she’s a little thoughtful trying to rewind a little further back before that other voice came in and clanged everything all up saying, ‘nnnnooooowwww if i was just about on this portion of the subject.  ooohhhh yeah oohhh yeah that portion there we are now that’s geting nice and easy so just turn right around watch the lights back over in that direction return to you know…”  in just a second out from where she thought she’d started she’d forget where that third voice was in the first place.