no more shade from the skeletal
red buds in the yard, no tree frogs,
no trills of the poor
short-lived cicada

no longer the Spring of your
life, no longer time for 
the heat-seeking satyrs who 
devour up the lonely grasping 
hard at some breath of heaven

you, deep-rooted, yet consumed
by the sun, are fragile, lost...
you, to whom zenith, nadir,
and zodiac are all one big blur,
have changed...turned with the
leaves

eventually all faun gods save one
returned to their 
unbounded heaven that transmutes
all, but your breath
still catches, fastening onto
those youthful images and words

the war was inside you, only
child's play at first, but from then 
on, with the faun you chose, 
the going was harder; now your 
friends are all tired of your tears
and who more than you hates whining

you have made your peace, but
what lies beyond the horizon
lures you still, and you will 
eventually hurl yourself up, up
out of the mire at the glimpse 
of a whole, orange moon rising,
beckoning tide 
and love like the Sirens
to lap, lap away at
your heart

--Jo VonBargen 2011


"POWERFUL" "I cannot escape the tearing crash, scrape and rustle of your blind gropings & janglings" YOUR THIN BONES: Letters I Never Sent You http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005LKBR6A