Tuesday, May 14, 2013

METRO LACE



V.

May 14

In time we returned
to the house of words
and chose a wall,
each to his own.

“Why do it if it
can be done?” one asked.
Because it's fun
another replied.

All this bother for the sake
of a stone bench
and some trees
agitated on the green.

Not as pokey as molasses
but commentary, as
ever, remains superfluous
aired on other channels

like other victimless
crimes against the state
of being left out
in the cold

hard light of day
where none come but
friends to this ground
a ball player maybe.

These gems are cheap
at the price, cut-throat
as that may be, steady
for now but variable

later.  O build me a home
sweet cakes, able to last
generations unimagined
before, like fungoid growths

distributing increase
in all directions.  Some
say we copied this book
from earlier texts, loose

pages inked by monks
in the year of the flood or
just after.  Rebuke them
at your leisure, grant

what license you like.
Such barren paths abuse
our proud lineage, striped
or spotted as it is.

When the principal actor
quits the scene, strangely,
the scenery wants to follow,
leaving the stage bare.

That's when it's better
to rest in winter and prepare
the long boats, stack
melons upon a mattress

and cure provisions with salt.
Travel fulfills you, quite,
but you learn nothing
as the only sentient being

in a landscape, as if
you mean to prove at last
there's only room here
for one shadow.  Yours.




©Donald Brown 2010/2013





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