Bottle Half Buried

As he ducked under a branch,
it poured into his field of vision
There was a bottle half buried,
with a tapered neck protruding,
as from an earthen womb,
beyond the living forest floor
His mind flooded then
with the potential presented
That young lovers may have
slipped away unnoticed,
sharing between them its contents
Blood sweating in drunkenness
beneath the trees, the stars,
the hovering drone of fireflies...

Tuskbeast

He recognized the gathering of plants
as one remembers the burner of a stove,
but the nettles did not sting in daytime;
their acids absorbed in wool each night
At least his instincts told him so

He stood in the disarmed leaves,
watching as the dog wallowed in a rut
He closed his eyes and the ground cast aside;
each heave revealed a flash of cracked ivory,
a porcine snort, and a wrinkling snout

The dog wallowed still
frantic to place their wildness upon her;
she might once again be a wolf
And he considered:
Where did the tuskbeast slumber?

Only Segments

I remember only segments of the dream, but it's enough.
We were walking down a city street. It was nightfall. We were arguing about something, but already I felt defeated. At once there was a huge, dark, wooden structure with a windmill before us. I gasped at it's presentation. It was of the aesthetic I favored. But quickly I turned on it, and became annoyed when you wanted to go inside. It had changed now. Suddenly it was modern in presentation, with a black metal clock ticking on it's forward face. Something you'd see at a strip mall back in the States. And there were lines sectioned and a glass admission booth at the top of its steps. You bounded away for them, and I let out an exasperated remark (I know not what) before following. Inside was empty. The escalator hall looked like an airport at midday, but without people anywhere. There were no others. You jumped up onto an escalator climbing upward. I struggled after you, on an escalator adjacent but bound for the same direction. I was on my knees - so frustrated. I yowled and punched the near-mirror-finish of the metal siding. It warped my reflection grotesquely, and I regretted it immediately. Then I was running to keep up with you as ran down a hotel hall. I was calling out for you to just slow down. I wanted to talk to you. But you were babbling, saying nothing, as loud as you could, and plugging your ears with your fingers so as not to hear me as you skipped ahead.

It's much easier to understand now that I've read it in my own words.
I can't tell if that offers any comfort.

Seamless

I was studying cracks in the ceiling,
wondering if one could draw them;
draw the ceiling itself -
as it actually looked
I could hold the page at arm's length
above my face
and there would be no difference
Seamless

What would that be worth?

And over by the window
the light changes so subtly
on the ceiling
There is no fine line
showing light from dark
It's a gradation
so delicate
you can not tell light from dark
but if they were fragmented,
placed side by side
How does one render such?

What would it be worth?

There Were Others

There were others -
becloaked in moss and tree
I knew they were
but not where
Not what
I saw their leavings
and feasted upon them
Knees planted in the duff
offering my soul
to the forest
For I was a foreigner
standing at the meadow
Its depth descended in waves
of light and dark before me
And I felt,
there were others
Glassy-winged insects
landing upon my flesh
not to sting, but to eat
A putrid wallow,
surrounded by prints
The footfalls of the
beast were here,
preceding me
Any notion
mine might be the last
was vanity

Edgar Lee Masters

"I tramped through the country
To get the feeling
That I was not a separate thing from the Earth.
I used to lose myself
By lying with eyes half-open in the woods.
Sometimes I talked with the animals..."

Also:
"I have studied many times
The marble which was chiseled for me—
A boat with a furled sail at rest in a harbor.
In truth it pictures not my destination
But my life.
For love was offered me and I shrank from its disillusionment;
Sorrow knocked at my door, but I was afraid;
Ambition called to me, but I dreaded the chances.
Yet all the while I hungered for meaning in my life.
And now I know that we must lift the sail
And catch the winds of destiny
Wherever they drive the boat.
To put meaning in one’s life may end in madness,
But life without meaning is the torture
Of restlessness and vague desire—
It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid."

Ilsanjo

Only one star hung in the sky then,
just a grain of salt in the scope of his vision,
and the moon hung waxing over the basin
where, naked, he swam once more
On his back, the concavity of the earth
seemed to press down around him
He could see the bats overhead
feasting on winged insects
The distant call of a great horned owl
careening across the surface of the water
The goings about of unidentified mammals
- one could hear their paws on the shore
He just swam there naked as them,
alone in his goose-bumped skin,
dusk closing in around Ilsanjo's waters
And he wanted for nothing