Many Are the Dark Places

by | Feb 4, 2020 | Issue Thirteen, Poetry

Recognize and be recognized.

No one burns for that anymore. Beyond that,

don’t you just love rivers?

Particularly the Styx? Beyond that still,

there goes the hand helped make superstars.

You stuck it out, stayed awhile and got it on.

Now you’re draggin’ wood and your parents are coasting. Beyond that,

where went all the good times, the rose gardens?

Lungfish have lungs. Beyond that still,

they farm their own farms.

Is that the final destination of the worried? Beyond that,

better than brimstone pangs of guilty conscience.

Pain and loss and heresy. Beyond that still,

sulfur rejects of the Majority in darkness.

The alternative to Paradise.

This exceeds the typical anyone, anywhere. Beyond that,

no familiarity, no memory?                We do like them.

Information, people, surroundings. Beyond that still,

imagine clean sweep.                          Starting out all over again.

That’s the thing about rivers; long-winded, complicated.

Nothing equivalent. Beyond that,

except in the eyes of a friend out of a crowd. Beyond that still,

no one.

Pin It on Pinterest