No cryptic message here,

Only elasticity,

A focus so narrow;

The lines bend and blend together

On the days where only an occasional engine is fired up

and the rest of the world is on a vacation ,

Hanging above white sand in a hammock,

                                                                 hat pulled over their eyes like a sleeping cowboy.

There is a mild smell of sulfur in the air,

and the recitation of scripture is aglow and

                                                                                                           very, very real.

Followed by the echoes and certainly by

 the explosions of geysers in national parks,

 the explosions of geysers in national parks,

Posturing for something more real, then a tourist wearing a sweaty visor.

A buzzing of winged insects…

A plague is upon us,

The crops are safe through

The crops are safe though,

When hyphens replace all other forms of punctuation,

and the sound of thunder threatens the heavens and the earth

but never really makes an appearance,

A hallmark;

A bookmark;

A certain salvation

Signed  and left (for dead)

 

In a box, topped with a red flag,

Topped with a  red fire,

                                on the very edge of the property line,

on the very end of the galaxy,

on the very edge of the ocean,

The fire visible for miles, for eons even.

Burning resolutely,  like an archangel in exodus,

Like a string of holiday lights,

Left hanging a little too long.

 

 

 

 

                                        Born again,

Stuck in time

Awash with                                                    movies

&

with fairies

and on an afternoon

That was blessed

and

cursed

With no clouds whatsoever.

With no chance whatsoever.

A hopelessness blows,

Not loudly enough to move the wind-chimes.

Shining through the closed widows,

Keeping the sinners and widows out

                                                        Passing through ruffled curtains-

Passing through deserted towns-

Phasing in

&

Out again

Hating their own handwriting-

Nursing their  own injured  hamstrings-

Waiting for the oven to finally preheat

Seconds turn into place settings and minutes turn into

musical chairs.

What little light does shine through,

illuminates the dust-

Illuminates the angels present within this corridor,

Salvaging what can be salvaged.

This motion picture,

Stuck in this quicksand-

Tundra clouds fast approaching,

                                                  Tires screeching,

&

Sounds from tired  chainsaws.

Sounds born from the mouths of volcanoes,

Sounds born from some distant forest,

Sounds born out of violence.

The only place to truly rest,

Is glued to a loveseat,

In between previews,

Tossing and turning,

Calling out for any hero,

Calling out for any gorgon,

in between previews

                                                                                       still lost in the mist.

 

 

Summer days spent like currency,

Exchanging hands and falling in between the cracks,

                Feeling in between the seats, but still out of reach.

          Falling in between stars, but still out of reach

                                                     As the windshield wipers make their case as hypnotists.

                                            As the headlight make their case as exhibitionists.

Blowing like leaves,

Yet afraid of the  height from which they fall.

A land of no water but of so many possibilities,

So many waterfalls,

Infinite ideas blooming all the time,  like a garden when spring is thrown  onto the canvas,

                                                                      By a very tired winter.

                                           By a very tired wint…

Stray cats, and their non-existent collars spring back and fourth like volleyballs,

Darting from yard to yard, scaling fences like

Rampant tricksters,

Or wayward volleyballs,

Spiked over taut nets,

Silent as they make their way;

                                                      Worrying the  panting dogs and delivering on their promise of annexing all the  surrounding above ground pools.

Still at night.

Still in the night.

Watching intently the   boundless peasant, wandering the countryside and begging for crumbs,

Flask  at his hip, concealed in paper bags,

           Or in yesterdays newspaper,

Shirt wrinkled and un-tucked,

What hair is left, having never felt the embrace of a comb.

                         having never lifted a finger anyways,

sneaking in when the old mother falls asleep, listening  to talk radio,

Seeking out a place to sleep, and nothing more.

But the observant  cats,

Looking for the flattest rooftops on which to imagine the moon as a ball of yarn,

And dream of unwinding it,

and tiptoeing around  the fluctuating  tides that would

Inevitably spill over  as a result,

Spending nights like these,

Only ever keeping one eye open for the occasional sprinkler,

With either poor or perfect timing, depending on you’re perception;

Days will arise and garage doors open,

&

The houses yawn,

The houses yawn,

A potted plant, cut from the cloth of another.

Cain & Abel, in garden form.

Gifted by a neighbor, a traitor.

Planted by a founder, and an innovator,

The banana tree shoots upward into the sky like a beanstalk,

This  particular crop yields no giants though.

                                                                         This particular crop yields no giants though.

All the eyes of all the cats,

Eyes like marbles and like planets and some like bottle-caps,

Watch the tree grow gently at first,

Crawling on it’s hands and knees,

Tended to ,

&

pruned and showered with praise,

Sent off to college to learn lessons of nutrition,

& incandescence, and other incarnations of light.

Then battered by sharp, seasonal  winds that shred the leaves like tissues,

                               in it’s adolescent years.

Looking  more now like bony fingers and tattered flags

then  the once vibrant, technicolor leaves of yesterday,

But with an focused

&

                                                     Nimble  audience such as this.

Such as the one existing  only in this universe, watching from

Open windows, and

Some sitting in trees,

A select few seated in the VIP section,

who also get to fire the cannons, at the end of the ceremony.

            & their assortment of eyes,

& colors,

& duties.

The banana tree regrouped,

Sat in a comfortable chair,

Spoke to a therapist,

& then

Cut it’s teeth on some discarded cinderblocks used to hold up

A  nearby derelict fence,

 practicing  the  lines so frequently  until they couldn’t   bare to echo  anymore.

And practicing the lines until they echo,

until they  sunk in forevermore.

With gaps  so large, entire suburban  conversations find their way through;

A toothy smile, slowly on it’s way down.

 Wayward trails of  smoke or steam float up and over,

like  the sultry , phantasmal arms of cartoons,

permeating from a destination unknown,

trying to recruit the passing vampires.

                                trying to recruit the technicians dispatched by cable companies.

Followed by a static  phone call,

To a pest control company, and

A subsequent  argument about pricing,  and the validity of termite prevention,

entirely   on speakerphone so the rest of the universe could can hear,

So it can be remembered, and archived,

                                if not only for the sheer magnitude of it all.

& as the applause began, and the trophy was being polished back stage,

The magician waved waves his wand, and all the clowns piled into one car, and for once the one-liners

&

Non-sequiturs from the mouths of the stand up comics,

Who took the stage last,

Didn’t fall flat.

                instead, they soared,

Over the tops of streetlights, and the heads of many others,

                                 and so  a

Beautiful bundle of bananas  was born,

                                Hanging on the wrong side of that fence,

                                                 Hanging just out of reach.

& then thy neighbor was gone, passed like a spirit into the mountains.

Pressed like a photograph into a scrapbook.

advice you should never take.

& the cats and all their eyes  were left,

                   left looking for something to sink their teeth into.

Looking for a place to store their daggers.

 Left behind  to watch the moving trucks and

The white horses pull away,

And the dust that will settle behind them.

A finely manicured lawn, and some low hanging fruit, the only reminders, of

                                                         what was.

 

Unlike wind-chimes,

Banging together,

                                A calamitous decoration,

Hoping to be everything the xylophone never has been,

In a still wind,

The mythology is entrenched, and over saturated, now more than ever.

Written on the walls of caves, and embossed on the front of business cards,

A phone rings in a quiet house,

Sounding like apples falling to the earth,

In a faraway orchard,

Each fruit more sweet than the last,

Each crater deeper than the last,

                          Each fruit, moving faster then the next.

                                                                     Pulling gravity down,

& waving a blanket in front of it’s face,

Waiting for the snarling bull to charge,

Waiting for the horns to tear into reality,

Silent  silverware, and steaming platters, laid out for a feast;

Interrupted,

Unobstructed,

Reluctant to try something new.

Unable to keep the silence,

Unable to keep the peace,

A din that drowns out dinner follows suit,

Dressed to the nines of course,

Skipping  both the eighth and seventh cloud on it’s way down;

The sound of a thousand crowds, cheering for the lion instead of the gladiator,

& the squawking

A murder of crows sit atop the Colosseum, mocking the mockingbirds,

and admiring all the bricks it took to make this roost.

Waiting to pounce on the empty bags of chips left behind,

 A sober reminder of what was.

This cyclone moves through the city,

Breaches the plains, flattening cornfields, and farmhouses,

Taking up all the water from babbling brooks along the way,

                              and casting  it towards  oceans that are

Themselves, immune to suction of  any kind.

Only detracting from the salinity, slightly.

While the scarecrows wait with open arms, for birds that are

Already busy enough, with chores and other demonstrations.

With other demons;

With other demons;

The sound of a tornado,

The sight of a chimera on the horizon,

                    (if you squint)

Sounding more like wind-chimes then the wind-chimes themselves  ever do,

Glowing more lucid than any candle

                      or  brighter than any dream could ever be,

More black and white than any movie, or instruction manual,

More partial than any spatial arrangements,

Lining the tables at  a wedding,

Winding down, with mostly wineglasses stained with lipstick left behind,

As well as a few place settings that were never unfurled,

The vows said, still basking in the evening air,

More charisma than those  words could ever describe,

On a collision course with italics, 

Begotten by letters than are themselves, bold in nature,

Semantics, and rhetoric, scrawled on a note-card, that has been folded into

A swan,

                                        and left to admire;

Left to float.

Left to float.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In forging an alliance with the beautiful  Cleopatra,

On the banks of the  mighty flooded Nile,

the pundits,

who study earth science,

who come bearing  frankincense

                        Stand ankle deep on one side,

&

the mighty

Ear Nose and Throat doctors,

                                                                      the bandits, if you will.

Stand waist deep on the other.

Trading barrages, like steady boxers, in a game of headaches.

the bandits,

                        Make proclamations that break the sound barrier, and inch civilization closer to singularity,

But choosing to disregard  the magnitude of magnetism.

Fields of forget-me-nots force  a sort of   nostalgia,

                                                        Incidentally another good name for a flower…

& their waiting rooms are filled again.

Their expensive aquariums filled to the brim with water,

& fish

& patients

& people who will smudge the glass.

The patients are alive,

alive as they flip through glossy magazines,

Feet extended,  sunglasses covering their eyes.

Almost lounging in a room that is far from any beach,

Thriving off crossword puzzles that have already been solved,

And samples of perfumes, that only smell like the magazine itself.

Missing beach towels, though.

Missing the  sun, too.

A receptionist takes refuge  behind a transparent sliding door,

Taking notes and constantly looking over her shoulder.

Hoping the pen chained to the counter has enough tensile strength to hold the weight of the world,

…and that no one will ask her for one of her mints.

the pundits,

                                                                      the earth scientists,

Evict the very legend of King Arthur  & his fair Guinevere from his round table,

                                 & stick gum to the bottom

And turn on the T.V, to a daytime talk-show…

& laugh

& laugh,

As they spin the spaghetti from their microwave dinner,

With plastic forks.

They arrive in limousines of mediocrity,

                                                                   Dressed in suits of sapphire.

Golf clubs thrown in the back of the sedan parked in their driveway, at home.

One of the very last things, they will consider before they take the podium.

In front of house that badly needs the grass to be mowed,

In  front of a house that sits on top of  catacombs,

                                                      A family still waves, bright eyed, dressed in matching outfits.

To both,

 the pundits & the bandits,

Whose feet are now wet, and are beginning to shake with the  cold wind.

The conferences are over.

                              The earthquakes have begun.

The diagnosis is complete, and the prognosis is the protagonist has contracted paralysis.

With the blowing wind, and the sky turning a bright pink,

Off  they go on their  various magic carpets, clouds,   monster trucks and sandals that fly as quickly as any bird or any god ever could,

Gone to

 

Sleep in faraway hotels, tucked under sheets of silk,

Sleeping soundly, knowing two things damn well:

There is a brand new bible tucked in the drawer of the nightstand.

&

There is an ironing board in the corner, that looks like a monster, if you let it.

& a third thing,

A blinking clock awaits passing glances,

A continental breakfast awaits the morning after, with eggs

                                                                 Sunny side, up.

 

 

 

 

Weathered, and tethered to nothing,

Bound,  but not by laces, but instead by  the two faded yellow lanes,

That divide this highway,

This gap between two crumbling cliffs.

No rope bridges in between,

No swashbuckling cutthroats, hacking through bramble and bush, in search of

Something.

Anything that almost  looks like them.

No stuntmen,

Whose goggles  are fastened tighter than that of any scientist, in search of

Something.

Anything that almost looks like a trophy.

                              A  black flat,

Melted and nearly flattened by scores of screeching  tires and curse words and cursory glances and

Clinched fists, and

Car-seats buckled so tightly.

so tightly.

Affixed  now to the asphalt,

Asphyxiating on the the puddles of exhaust and crude oil, and

An unpleasant steamy rain,

That gathers at  the same temperatures  from which they fell,

                    maybe even hotter. 

And runs away,

                    maybe even hotter.

A warm bath for a sole that could use one.

                                                                A warm bath, when the shower is out of order.

A black mamba,

It’s jet black scales, onyx by any other name.

                    Once considered  exotic and organic,

By the farmers that never actually attend farmers markets,

By the same  judges, who leave their powdered wigs on when they sleep,

And talk on their phones during movies…

Domesticated and left to breed among the          common snakes,

                                                                                      Among the common sneakers,

Bowing to the the reverent  applause.

A black star,

Ready to implode,

                        Ready to take the other galaxies and their scrambled planets for a ride.

Checking the ignition switch, and thumbing through the hymnal…

Beaming the flashlight through the dark woods,

                                          Cutting holes in the air, and blinding oblivious moths,

Disregarding anything remotely remote.

                                                                                   But never changing the channel.

Barely touching the ground,

                                                               Disregarding the  all -too- popular use of ellipses,

That unfortunately never seem to   make an appearance  during an eclipse-ses.

Searching for the oldest, wisest  tree stump in the forest,

The same  one, hidden behind curtains of saw-grass, and termite mounds taller than

Most skyscrapers…

Abandoned,

                                                                                                               Like most skyscrapers, 

Searching for the only place to sit down, and sing that perfect hymn.

Splayed out in the  very green grass, the very next day.

Contemplating retirement,

Stewing over a certain stew and a curtain call,

Consulting  any number of electricians from all corners  of a phone-book,

Consulting ghosts, from  the only four  corners of the  mausoleum,

Looking for anyone to turn on the right light,

Except the fireflies…

who haven’t even put on their reading glasses yet.

A simple soap dish-

Procuring a bar of soap,

That withers at the same pace as an autumn leaf,

A theater seat,

(an autumn leaf)

in the thick of it,

A secluded seat,

(In an autumn house)

Overlooking a desolate landscape and a desolate audience;

This  ivory balcony,

Cradling  an ivory emperor,

Embracing an ivory civilization.

Overlooking grout that desperately needs to be cleaned and empty shampoo bottles,

Overlooking strawberry fields and unhappy denizens,

That look more like chemicals  when the lights are on, then they are when

All the lights go off.

Empty gladiators, when the sun goes down.

Empty houses, when the candles burn out.

When the curtain is pulled away…

                                          When the contrails slowly fade away…

This white coliseum,

White not like the heavens

White not like the heavens.

This kingdom is revealed,

Having housed so many decorative soaps over so many filthy years;

Silent soaps and black & white soaps,

Translucent greens and blues soaps indigo’s and violets shine right through the frosted glass,

Technicolor soaps,

More beautiful than any salt lamp or crystal skull;

Lathered onto chapped elbows;

Every color is present but the rainbow itself.

                                    & the elbows themselves are absent, too.

& the audience themselves are absent too,

Thank god for the TelePrompter.

& the echoes

& the echoes

In this lone white  stall;

In this lone white stall;

This lone white horse, with its lone white carriage  who will always ride alone, off into the white of the clouds.

The floor of this sanctuary,

Having been scorched by dragons, and conquered by

Invasive species after invasive species…

Crawling with impunity  and abbreviations;

Left  only with paradigms  and cavernous chasms;

Tiled like a checkerboard,   only missing the black spots

                                              (As well as the players themselves)

So that there might never be any kings.

Or any moons,

                                                                                    Or metaphors.

Or jumping of any kind.

Elaborate frescoes made up of hand-prints and  beading water that runs slowly down the walls after a certain mist begins to evaporate.

Unintentional artistry that lacks artisans,                                                          of any kind.

After the faucets are instead turned counterclockwise,

So that they can both look at one-other, and fall in love with one-other.

But never hold one-another,

&

To fall asleep in separate beds.

All that is within these walls,

What is within these walls,

Protected by that frosted glass door, that could possibly fall off its rusted hinges at any moment.

And no guards.

Never any guards.

Aside from the soap, and in the rarest of seasons, a bottle of conditioner,

Conditioned to withstand next-to-nothing.

Only a select few  forces exist here.

Save for the occasional  daddy long legs, that is  all too careful not to get it feet wet.

Holding it’s expensive new boots over its head with one hand,

While carrying its young in another,

and its luggage in another,

Tiptoeing  through the deluge, while sidestepping the wreckage that is slowly circling the drain.

No bars either.

No snakes either.

                                                                                          Only sunken ships.

& shrieking hydras.

This ghostly prison,

This ghostly ocean,

Complete with the peeling wallpaper,

 That successfully imitates sand-dunes, peeled back with

Each

Gust

Of

Wind

This palatial landscape,

(Minus the area rug)

Offers no official windows so that wayward birds may perch,

& sing…

& sing…

Songs of freedom and silver  river bends,

 Songs of silver  rolling hills and  white picket fences,

                      Songs 

Of bayonets and treasure chests.

Of bayonets and treasure chests.

 

These are songs unsung.

These songs about bayonets and treasure chests.

These songs about bayonets and treasure chests.

Songs that can only be found inside a treasure chest.

The ghostly inmate isn’t  afforded a jaunty tune,

Or camaraderie of any kind.

It can only communicate  with sign language from across the vacant room;

The soft defenseless  slab of marble.

This slowly disintegrating bar of soap.

Like a carefully sliced loaf of bread;

Trembling before it makes its way into the oven, quietly accepting what  should define the mortality of a loaf of bread.

 Assuming its fate was to be sculpted and nothing more.

-Sweating Michelangelo now more than ever.

At one point, unequivocally whole,  and  solely alone with only

Brave plants and other invertebrates, to converse with.

   Tucked into a messy drawer of assorted toiletries,

Not quite as sharp as the drawer full of cutlery,

And not quite as bitter a drawer full of spices.

 Before the chisel  inevitably  arrives,

Before a dragon breathes such fire that the entire village is destroyed.

Before a hand reaches out and squeezes too hard.

& the train arrives at the a station a moment too late,

This final  bar of white soap procures itself,

Like a dove, searching for any sign of land.

& An olive branch.

& an olive.

Sunbathing without any sun.

                                                                                But with a plethora of towels.

Over time, through showers,

Both hot & cold,

Though shadows,

Under umbrellas;

All that is left, when all is said and done and molded,

Fixated and torn apart with talons,

Is residue left  under fingernails,

       Relegating time to be told on sundials,

                                                                     While nesting birds sing underneath it all,

not yet ready to fly.

 

Dust collects politely in  monogrammed champagne flutes , and  on top of pictures that haven’t moved  since they last sat in mansions.

While some of the pictures,

That were purposely

Hung askew on crooked walls so that the walls  themselves  might one day  be straight.

These crooked pictures complete with compelling images etched in watercolor.

Scenes reminiscent of the pioneer days,

Complete with wagon wheels leaned up against trees that bear no leaves, and

no fruit.

no fruit.

In the middle of overgrown   cornfields,

That carefully hide coiled snakes, coon-skin hats,

&

Cabins off in the distance with billows of smoke ten miles long…

However their is surprisingly,

                           In starch  stark contrast;

no corn.

no corn.

Some occupants of this room,  pass by/through untouched,

                                     unnoticed,

  by brushstroke, cursory glance, glasses of water, or otherwise…

Like careful ghosts, tiptoeing around the campfire.

A nightstand  complete with a lamp that is never lit sits next to a window that is never open.

Next to the lamp leans a  picture in a gaudy green frame,

Circular in shape, and in theme and in origin.

And when the sun shines just right, through that filthy window,

It appears as though the suns very shadow has been cast onto the floor,

Unlike any crown of thorns,

A lot more like spilled milk, or an oil spill.

The dusty nightstand has scars of its own,

Scales of it’s own.

Rings that at the time  were thought to be temporary,

But after coats of armor and furniture polish failed to conquer the rings,

They are now left as a reminder, a lesson, a souvenir

To use a coaster.

Rings that came to be from sweaty glasses,

Some of them more full of solutions then others.

Or  the rings  could  have fallen from the waists of Saturn, & Neptune,

Like a discarded belt.

Which would inevitably  explain some of  the moons in the galaxy.

Left to sweat in the sun when the  room lived a more exposed life.

When proprietors  would set up shop on daybeds and read sonnets aloud, like optimistic bards, in the sunlight,

in the sunlight.

The withered belt,

Planetary or not,

Is  usually left next to the laundry basket after a long day at the office.

Next a case of potpourri

Or

Next to an unloaded hunting rifle.

As a gentle breeze blows outside through the tops of trees. 

These rings wont necessarily tell the age of the  room.

They  will not  take the temperature, either.

Mercury is absent here in every way, shape or form.

A museum room,

A man on the moon,

This  room which accumulates all the dust and virtually  no traffic.

No thoroughfare and no economic stimulation,

A bed where no one rests,

A rocking chair that never rocks,

And curtains that occasionally rustle,

Giving the impression of occupation,  or humanity.

Tiaras and scarves of worn in winters past exist here only in dreams,

Thick coats, pockets heavy with forgotten change, hang  quietly in closets.

Because the piggy-banks cant be trusted

Exiled by grammar, and  changing seasons.

The reality is more contingent on the smell of purple  iodine and mountains of  mothballs,

and  suitcases with absolutely nothing in them.

Much like the captains quarters on a sailing ship;

                                                   Or the set of a movie;

Filled to the brim with rubies so common,

&

Extra chairs, and other miscellaneous furniture

  Wrapped carefully  in sheets like in the tomb of some ancient Egyptian Pharaoh.

Some of the collectibles are  placed higher on mantles, where the air is much thinner,

And questions can be avoided,

Renegade pocket watches swing like the tails of content cats,

Old trophies that come to life and hit home runs at night,

And  ceramic figurines that only ever sit on a bench, and never, ever move.

Mostly sand, is what the backyard should refrain from.

However with the unrelenting sun, combined with neglect,

Sung in unison,

Sung in refrain.

Here lies a wasteland;

Choked constantly by dying  weeds, all the life here lives below the frost-line.

Up on top, living in air that appears to be melting.

This air is melting.

Or perhaps  this is another mirage altogether;

But where has the ice cream gone?

Fertile soil is miles away, separated by chain-link fences and barking dogs.

Brave grass from those surrounding  yards occasionally will stick courageous fingers through the fence, like a curious child,

In an attempt to inject life into this suburban desert;

In an attempt to  fully understand exasperation.

But like a caged, hungry animal on the other side, the yard consisting of mostly sand  will bite  anything that reaches through.

And like the  sudden snap of  of a middle finger and thumb ,

Like a crack of lightning,

Like milk being poured over cereal…

The grass is severed like an intrusive serpent, and left to wilt in the heat.

and carried away by Perseus.

Hot air balloons and passenger jets fly overhead,

Witnessing the carnage, but still focusing on the pictures they playfully draw in the sky.

Their  own versions of  what horizons may look like.

 Occasional oases will  sometimes appear,

Some of which will be more  permanent then others.

Some will have the same stripes as the other zebras…

Some will fade away like ghosts into the pages of books…

Sprouting up after a heavy rain, or  next to a leaky pipe before it can be repaired,

With a roll of tape,   whose functions have no limits.

Or a pipe wrench, whose functions are  limited to  mostly pipes.

 

&

They all  will  smile as they eat egg-rolls,

As a family.

  As they dance around the dinner table, later that evening.

Long before the cake has been cut,

Long after the candles have been blown out,

Long after Olympus Mons had begun to  crumble.

Even if these meager flowers are  the only  offspring of the seasonal weeds,

Set to expire like the eggs a certain timer is aptly named after-

It will still bring visitors,

Visitors with  plastic squares taped to their visiting chests.

Visitors arriving   their visiting hands stuffed into their visiting pockets.

Having brought  with them various entrees,,

All of which will already be cold due to the long drive.

All of which will already  be cold due to the long drive.

 

 

 

 

Buried beneath years of plaid, taller than most piles of ordinary leaves,

As well as a spirited amount of dust,

Bordering on the  cosmic…

Bordering on the rhetoric…

                Tucked into a dresser

|Standing|

|Four|

|Stories|

|Tall.|

Housing everything from socks to shoelaces and pocket watches

To batteries that had long ago run out of everything.

Charging virtually nothing to these tactile tenants.

All in all-

Pretty much a shipwreck

Pretty much a shipwreck

Minus only some of the necessary antiquities…

 The shirt was always there,  inadvertently buried next to  crumbling statues and  marble columns,

A steady tenant;

Even if it hadn’t been worn in a millennia or two.

The shirt even without someone wearing it was                         still able bodied.

Fit for so much  more than some old dancing skeleton…

Even if the moths had already come and gone.

                                                                    Even if the months had already come and gone.

                Like most stories;

            This one was still able bodied,

Sea legs and all.

This shirt started out neat;

Pressed and organized with other shirts cut from similar cloths.

Arranged in a similar fashion to that of the department store from which it came.

The shirt stood in good favor with the earth and all the other planets and stars,

                                                                                … and their inhabitants as well.

The shirt stood in good favor while traveling

Through epic  deluges with Gilgamesh and

Laying in barren fields under the guise of crop-circles, listening  intently to locusts who are all but tuned into their own frequency.

But like most knots;

Like most plagues;

Like most legends;

Like most cords on most telephones;

The shirt somehow became a tangled mess, sleeves crossed, (fingers, too)  and the edges frayed.

Suffocating under leagues of denim and scores of corduroy.

 A snake consuming its own tail.

                                The tireless, non-venomous

Patchwork serpent  freed one of its tangled sleeves and

Like a rising undead, or an exasperated explorer lost among thickets and mangroves

(With nothing left but a dull machete and a faded map)

The exasperated shirt reached out for something.

Searching for any semblance of light or life;

And instead only briefly  grabbing  a hold of the coattails of a fleeting mirage,

Before even those slipped away to some other desert.

To some other silver screen.

It would be quite some time before the shirt would be officially  worn again.

The seasons and  their various  fashions came together and rolled away slowly, like a snowball,

Not downhill at first, but  gradually gaining speed.

As it picks up splintering   hockey sticks and broken drums and wax paper from

All the local meat markets.

And ice skating rinks.

All of which had been

Left for dead by members of the team and the band.

And the butchers, too.

(They did remember to take their lettermen jackets and cleavers with them after the big game, however)

The shirt would never see a banquet hall or a ballroom.

                Or a battlefield or even an art gallery.

But these were  never the intended outcomes for this particular shirt.

To be fired from a cannon like some shrapnel.

To dance the night away in a room full of windows.

This shirt was destined to be worn while walking towards the sunset, on some sandy beach

…Three pens tucked neatly into the front pocket.

For which  to scribble on what exactly?

Driftwood?

The wings of crashed model airplanes?

This shirt was meant to be worn walking barefoot on asphalt,

While a stiff summer breeze blows, forcing the already  melting ice cream to drip back onto the shirt.

And provide texture,

(And context)

Before the final destination has even been reached.

Some noticeable  holes chewed by hungry insects

(Created either during storage or exploration.)

Do not effect the integrity of this shirt, instead they become windows,

Or eyes.

Or oil spills.

Some loose threads hang down like decaying vines or a graying beard,

They are more akin to rope ladders though,

Lowered down by the  first responders sent to  pick up any refugees that may have otherwise been left behind.

The eventual stains left by stick deodorant and lack thereof

Provide  all the  necessary stripes,

All the necessary streaks,

All the necessary combustion.

These attributes give the shirt an uncanny ability to look

For a moment,

Like so many things.

 Like a jungle cat.

Or a billboard, in the process of being painted.

Or a crashed model airplane, with missing wings.