distant dirge
I used to walk alone down past the street,
out in the rain despite the bitter cold.
So many houses lined the road in neat,
set rows of grey and beige, old plaster molds.
And I could see my breath, no more than mist
still grey. All cars would pass, hard silver, black,
so bleak, so I’d walk home.
Now-trampled lists
always littered the ground, to go fly back
to their forgotten home in dirt and ash;
yet lost, they stuck to wet cement to rot
beneath tire tracks and brand new shoes of rash,
bored people who deserve a treat they bought.
Sometimes I’d read those crumpled magazines
but all the ink had bled on my soft hands,
so I would drop them in the trash I’ve seen
a couple feet away.
I’m happy lands
exist in my head now of fantasies
where green is bright. I stay home watching them,
but it can get lonely. I sometimes see
a blade of grass by my window and am
a child again, wild in the wind and free.
Yet, how the street is cold and bleak in me…
azure flint
