[theseainside]

Graves (2006)

Plunge!
you breathed loudly.
I felt you push me free
and my view of you
was a golden face in silhouette
shimmers of starburst
watered outstretched ripples
when you let me go,
or set me free
(whatever you want to call it)
I plunged out and over the darkness...

Go free!
you called out.
a dizzyingly tangible sound at first,
and now such an underlying pain
stretched warm, hot, strained as time crawls.

Plunge!
you said once.
But
You never set me free, you never set me free.
Instead,
you are a noose
a fingernail nicking my Achilles heel
a brushing of your thumb bruises
an indent in the curve of my ankle.
You never set me free.

you never set me free...

Whenever I move forward
towards that spiraling blazing face,
a dusky ghost intercepts us, eclipses us.
I reach out --
empty wind
empty waves
empty flames
disintegrating earth.

I conquer you all the time,
I find as many arms as I can
who will hold me, bury me.
When they wither,
I fade a little each time
vacant and transparent
to free myself from you.

I conquer you all the time,
I absorb you.
I punish you.
I bury you, I bury you!

I want to bury you...

Yet, I am always standing still
looking in
light spills, wells
brushes a searching climb
outwards
from the open door.
I yearn to remain standing,
looking up
my mind running
towards stars and not into graves at my feet.

copyright L.A. 2006.