I remember
we took this path before.
We followed it on a hike
sometime in the first few months
after I moved back.
I remember
it was me, you, and David Gullins.
I don’t remember if I drove.
Maybe you drove.
But I do remember the three
of us
marching along through the woods.
We
were quiet
and I didn’t know you well then.
I walked in back.
Those were
my pipe-smoking days
and I held the pipe
firmly between my teeth
brooding
as we carried ourselves
down the trail which stretches
from the foothills
to the sea.
We looked like a train rolling backwards
down the track
with me puffing on sweet cherry tobacco
at the rear,
and you
delivering stump speeches
from the lead caboose
to every citizen squirrel
and finch
down the line.
I remember we stopped
and had a snack before we turned around,
me pulling a bag of tortillas
from my pack
which I was in the habit of carrying and eating.
I wish you could walk this
trail with me now –
Skyline to The Sea –
but somewhere along the way
you turned back.
Filed under: poems | Tags: beds, dreams, fabric, food, music, sex, the outdoors, windows
A dream
of silent life
is what I wanted.
But in my head
an endless music plays
that bleeds into the fabric
of my dreams
constantly,
and last night an angry rhythm
of random images
pounded themselves out while I slept –
morning sex,
a hot shell in cool young light,
covers up over our heads
and my breath on your neck;
my house,
coopted by a group of hardened journalists,
at whose intrusion I played heavy metal to
drive them away;
pasta in a bowl three feet deep
that I could not eat
and damn near fell into;
and a damp and foggy park in the early hours of day
with a miniature playground,
a kid on a bike pedaling over the wet grass,
abandoned cars with frosted windows
sitting in a parking lot on the far side
and a gathering of Armenian boys
in the back,
a low slung fence
and a turnstyle gate
made of wood…
…perhaps as soon as I
scrape these from my subconscious
I can figure out how
to make the real world disappear,
as well.
