Out of place sun shines over a picket post cemetery
leaning against green hills.

Neatly tended lawns lay carpets of soft
and respectfully uniform sorrow

while watch tower trees are manned by keen observing birds
singing to pass the time.

Visitors are frequent, coming to browse the many headstones
sighing in sympathy with the loss of so many;

respectfully negotiating the tragic minefield
set by the outline of their coffins.

The barely audible crunch of hearses arriving in sorrow
over dutiful gravel whispers in mourners ears

to tell of new residents, each one a mother’s son,
many a woman’s husband.

But I cannot shed a single tear for them; merely names to me.
I didn’t know them like this man.

A friend, a mentor, a gentleman and a brother;
and here he will finally rest easy,

undisturbed by his troublesome ways.
Here he will rest in the hard to reach sunshine,

leaning against the green hills of home
in a picket post cemetery.

The fevered dance of common garden fly
busies about the creaking laburnum;
a mating rite, a dispute over territory.

Taking curious precedence over the crowded daisies
this ritual plays out to an old piano’s opus.

Envious magpies sweep by lacquered ivy;
green and swaying in a summer evenings breeze
the leaves are laminated in a soft, warming light

as playfully they jump to the delicately flecked horizon;
stretching to touch upon the lazy evening cloud.

As the shadows stretch to the hanging pot
and loose brick walls settle for the night
the pale rose trellis lets go its quiet petal,

lingering in an updraft before slipping through the sunset
this morbid waltz is set to the oceans steady rhythm.

Distant, yet strong in its cadence,
this final arpeggio ushers in a funeral bell
that rises up through uninterrupted dusk.

With effort spent this orchestra draws to its end,
the applause has faded and the opera house is closed.

All that remains are the roses offered in adoration,
wilting now and strewn about an empty stage.

This vessel puffs her little sail
While, in port she sleepily lies
A gust of words, on wind arise!
Move Earth and Heaven with minds.

‘Tis never too late to seek new worlds
Though much is taken, much abides;
and if we sail beyond the sunset
We shall touch the Happy Isles.

Like a poem with only half their stanzas
My stories mostly fractured
Incomplete

Missing words and jumping tenses
My reader focuses
Only on the typographical

We all live and die by our words
Some faster than others
Some freefalling

My own self-doubt seemingly accurate
And how that hurts
To read

I should write of brighter days and hopes and dreams
Of frantic wonder and joy
Of infinite splendor

But I cannot decide what to write
I’ve learned the hard way to scorn them all
Words

My muse once called me to marry a woman
Who would bear me children
But who ultimately left me penniless

My muse once called me to record my music
And I sang my brains out  for her
As she led me into bankruptcy

My muse once called upon me to write a novel
Dragging out the next ten years of my life
Kicking and screaming as I starved with my obsession

For no purpose whatsoever I still listen
Her siren song
Not a word of it ever true

Bluebonnets blowing across the forlorn Devil river
My feet sluggishly slapping its shallow end
The brightness of the sun competing with my smile
Underneath my smile are clouds darker than Carina Nebula
Underneath my smile, pain is slowly larking around
The corner of my lips, gradually turning downwards
The pieces of my heart tumbling like an ending tune of
Mozart’s No.16 at its best resonance
My head shaking back and forth, fighting the tears
Descending its way down my soft red cheeks
Told myself I would be strong, I would be stronger
But somehow my heart is more fragile than the pool of water
Reflecting my scared inner thoughts and dreams
Told myself I would be strong, I would be stronger
Every word that you said replays itself a in backward
Birth of achiness and tightness around my soul
So now I’m at lost for every move I make is a step
Closer to heartache
At the moment heartache is a better friend than
The embarrassment and conclusion that love doesn’t
Always love you back.