Cold gray settles upon the prairie.
Winter’s approaching in endless train,
Stretching its frosted fingertips
Through the severed stalks of grain.
I hear the rumble of each freight car
And can neither embrace nor abstain,
Caught in numb paralysis
By the biting jaw of pain.
Voicelessly, I loose my lament;
The empty fields hear me complain
And lay in motionless apathy
Down every hill and lane.

I search for the warmth I’ve known,
The tender hands, but the world is not the same.

In my empty bed, I reach for him,
The husband of my many years.
I stretch my icy fingertips,
In half-sleep, I feign him here,
But the uncrushed pillow stands resolute
He will never again appear.
I wander through the coming cold
A stricken child who stumbles, veers,
Careens into each obstacle
Searching for who I once held dear
But the absence of all that once was there
Is the void that interferes.

And the precipitous coming of the cold
Threatens snow upon my tears.

I’ve awoken from the deepest dream
Night terrors left my landscape changed
I find my world, and the foundations of me,
Vandalized and rearranged

But where there’s life, there’s hope.

The friendships I made in waking sleep
Now apparitions I cannot reinhabit
But the promise stands from far away
As though etched upon some ancient tablet

And I believe from forgiven unbelief.

I feel more like myself again
The quiet girl who reads and waits
For the latter buds that sneak and bloom
Along the outer edge of the garden gate

Those late and mysterious beauties.

Though as by some raging, ruinous storm
I wake and walk through strewn debris
Detritus from a former life,
Razed remnants of the former me,

But through wild wind and heavy rain,
I find the Timeless Cornerstone unchanged.

We filled the boxes carefully
Tucking in each package tightly
Like a mother puts her brood to bed
Delicately, but spritely.

We piled the boxes high
One atop the other
Stacking rows and columns
As both support and cover.

We positioned the pallets in a line
Like worthy ships fit for their class:
A regatta with signs for sails
We bade farewell as they sailed past

Into the gales of merchantry and
I was proud of the fleet we made.
A good day’s work;
An honest trade.

We counted the stars upon our arrival
Just after the melt of the snow
Orion, Cassieopia, the milky belt, but
I could not yet know

Our love was just as distant.

The children ran to and fro
As tiny conquistadors taking a stand
Conquering acres of freedom
Taming a brave new land

Of promise and potential and hope.

We surveyed all we owned,
All we earned through toil and tears
The land was good; the promise stood
The fruit of our fruitful years

A proper nest for a bountiful brood.

But the stars burned like molten silver
Falling on us one by one
Until the land incinerated
Until all our dreams were done

And the bones of what we might have become
Lay exposed in the yard under a merciless sun.

Walking a dark night of the soul
Grooves through the grief and rejection
The indifference of my companions
Anonymity and protection
Some desire creeps in for night to take me;
We sit instead in his cold apathy
In the quiet room of winter awakening
I wait bated; he only stares back at me
Bored with my existence:
Our bond is an old one.
I have nothing left to say,
No passion to embolden.
Neither of us has the energy
To strike the other.
We sit still, numbed by chill,
Interred by the cold that covers

The graves of all seasons.

We sang amongst the lightning bugs
Slapping at the biting bugs
Like percussive beat-keepers
We watched like seekers
And rested like natives.
And if this song can be excavated
I’ll play its bones
I’ll play its bones

Upon my own.

We knew the grass by name
Knew the heat and flame
Of wild wood burning against the moon
Too wild to foresee ash consume
Our simple days
But in their graves
I’ll play their bones
I’ll play their bones

Upon my own.

Wild
Eyed and throated
Straining in screams
Floated
Into empty fields where
Feral animals stalk
Endless prey
And we talk
At a table, we say nightmares
As lullabies
We kiss the horror
Grappling our goodbyes
Into tomorrow
We wait for the casket lid
To snap closed on us both
He said

Nothing, until
All at once…
He told it all.

How could you?

To make life easier
You toiled to the bone
Lying to me
So I built your home
While you enjoyed
Keeping me alone
Having someone to punish
With your cruelties unknown

And did this horror,
This act of monstrosity
Drizzle into your soul
As gray, numb monotony
Or break and gush
In malicious ferocity
Marring with necrosis
Your tender humanity?

A death by days
By tiny murders, tiny lies
These tiny pounds of flesh
Coldness to the cries
Exacted from my soul
In your great enterprise
Of breaking what you cannot hold:

Love.

I just woke up
Years lost to ether
I am jarred alert
Through numb and fever
By the sound of shattering
An echo by the time I hear:
A touch familiar, a touch foreign,
Unseen, but certainly near
Intact no more, I follow drafts
I wander room to room
Amid broken glass interred in dust
But I know this break is new
And the lights are blown
Debris is scattered
Photographs under foot
Retrace the shatter
In red tones streaming
From paneless moors
Blood on the moon
Castoff on the floor
Congealed in horror
Seized in fear
Don’t slide back to sleep:

Was there a murder here?

The last year
Required more than I had
Not in new demands
But old ones staggered
Closer together

I tried

I threw everything combustible
Into the furnace fuming
Then everything that was left
To keep the engine burning
But as we sputtered

Into the station

The engine died

Still I tried

Desperately working two rails
Pushing forward through pain
Isolated by indifference
Trying to remain
An adoring helper

As I promised to be
Forever
And in my fervor
To keep it together
The wheels fell off

And I stood in shock
In the silence of a train wreck
Beyond comprehension
In slow-motion reflection
And I saw the machine

Honestly
And for the first time.

I saw the apathy and resentment
Inside the casing
Of the words I believed
Poisoned pills- embracing
The thing that deceived me

Because I agreed I was too much
And too little
To deserve love
I worked and whittled
Myself to sharpened bones

And apologized
For what was no sin
And groveled
For permission
To be myself

I can’t unsee the wreckage.

I wandered out numb
To a gentler place
Kindness framed
Familiar new faces
I sat in peace

Even joy.

I wasn’t working, fighting,
In the blood and the sweat
Or paying assigned penance
Before the accusations were read-
I was just a woman.

I was real and seen
I could sing and play
And I was limited too,
And that was okay
I was a real woman.

It was the best I’ve ever felt.

Now I’m entering the marathon
Set ahead of me
One I must run
By necessity
And I must.

My feet pick up the pace
The repetitive drumming
But I carry with me all the
Hopscotch and humming

In the burnt-out hollowed
Engine room of my soul.