on my daily walk I see just
ahead a frantic woman...
oh god! she shrieks, curdling
my heed, then, nothing
sprinting fast, a thud pulses
my ears, the heart warning...
I halt, panting, at the house
where she seemed to live
tentative, my feet creak the
old porch, then pause...
an open door, no movement,
my hesitant helloooo?
on the floor, scattered papers,
an overturned desk, air still like
the last global pall...
eerie silence
swallowing hard, the dark
portal breached, I peer madly...
the heart quickens to choose
stand or flee
~I know...I know this place~
like in a bad dream, I see walls
pocked with fury, drapes purpled
in ache, sobbed poems
in shreds on a Navajo rug
feet stumbling in gloom,
I shudder: shards of pottery,
strewn petals the vermilion of
killed dreams
~where is she, good god, I
have to help her~
sun nearly set, I frenzy on
through shadowy rooms, their
lived-in decor now stiff, arranged
corpses, splayed in regret
a soiled, crumpled duvet seems
rust seep on a stitched shroud,
bitter light from the bath glares
faith snatched down a drain
dusty pictures, old flutes, a
leather drum, lie bereft on
a once-grand piano
now empty of claire de lune
a reflecting pool draws me
through the veranda door, its
still surface mute in the hush,
unwilling to wisp its secrets
~oh god...I remember this~
rounding tall pampas grass
to return to my quest, dread
falters my feet, fierce resolve
blunders on
ears perked on sound seeming
skyward, I look up...far, far
past Borealis to the conflux of
keen spirits shouting my name
with thunderbolt knowing, a hard
clench of spine, I streak toward
my kin on the Ghost Road, out of
reach of her fate...and mine
--Jo VonBargen 2011
"POWERFUL" "I fumble for keys as you fall on the ground and roll under the tires" YOUR THIN BONES Letters I Never Sent You - on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005LKBR6A
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