Someone leaves
mounts the sleek limousine of his youth
waiting for him at the kerb, all along
he's slept in a chair through the film,
left before the ending, where-
A siren goes off like an alarm
and I've made it as far as the runway, with the getaway plane
at the last border, the seedy outpost, the no-man's zone
you can't cross without being run down by the cops
or shot in the head by a spook or a geek
where they destroy your dreams with a flick of a switch
blow your brains out like a surgical operation
calmly, sadly, they've seen it all before . . .
down the dark last lane, in trees - close-kept shades,
there I lie, slain, pierced by a faint star, an arrow of moon-
silver glinting on the road
is my booty, or the knife, unknown
which is which, & the horse stands there
quietly drooping its long head to my body
in a stain of brightness against the dark
its long mane shifts in the wind
as that blood is flensed clear in the rinsing moonlight
& the blade washed clean
speaks in flashed glints,
slowly turning, under the eternal light
of evening bleeding scarlet now
out of the gash between earth and heaven
it waits, without a burden, white horse,
I was the weight that made it fly,
now at the final border, last date,
on the site of some lost civilization of the night
it's fixed there for all eternity,
silent,unmortal, faintly glowing
as my pale bright corpse
leaks back into the dark tight-
pursed seams of earth and rock
But meanwhile back inside we're wedged up against the tv again
where you sit intently trying to read the flickering images
where the hand is slowly reaching for your thigh or the gun in the glove compartment always
and the taxi droning out into a receding place of arrival says
Better if the past hijacks your plane anyway
than floating around in circles of empty air
looking for something that's neither here nor there.
If it didn't, you'd be back
seeking the bomb, the cop, the spook or geek
the fatal flaw
what derailed and saved you-
that was your passport out, your ticket in, your door
into yourself
I walked away
on the other side of yesterday
and life began again.
down the quiet lane, in trees - thick-woven, rippling shades
there the horse stands, drooping its heavy mane
as if waiting for its rider to rise, unslain.
Copyright 2007 by the Tipton Poetry Journal.
All rights remain the exclusive property of the individual poet and may not be used without their permission.