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Under the vines

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        Ways the willow swishes freely,

washing the wind into the sun.

Child in a tree fort dives fearlessly,

surging with elation to and fro:

over snails and uncut grass,

elements passing, back against the evening sun.

        Waves are the evidence of the ocean’s breathing.

Minds run swift, masterpieces of destinations,

forming their own geography.

Reality burns like a blood-clot –

an over-stuffed museum, updating slow.

Pirates of power and horoscopes bleating,

the only refuge is to forget.

        Out through a backyard window, the willow tree

owns both ground and sky.

Imagination comes as suffering’s negation,

potpourri to the stench of debt and worse-things owed.

Destruction overtakes too easily,

like a once-hollow ditch, now satisfied with its

fill of bones. All needs are political. Heaven

comes close in secret Sex, immortalizing flesh,

though never arresting decay.

        Child on a vine joined with the ways of the willow,

swinging, thrown-off shoes.

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.Copyright  © 2012 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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First published in “Guwahatian, Volume 1, Issue 8”, 2014

 

http://www.guwahaticity.in/Guwahatian/Vol1_Issue8/ipmc8.php

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

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“Allison’s poetic prose is insightful, enwrapping, illuminating and brutally truthful. It probes the nature of the human spirit, relationships, spirituality and God. It is sung as the clearest song is sung within a cathedral by choir. It is whispered as faintly as a heartbroken goodbye. It is alive with the life of a thousand birds in flight within the first glint of morning sun. It is as solemn as the sad-sung ballad of a noble death. Read at your peril. You will never look at this world in quite the same way again. Your eye will instinctively search the sky for eagles and scan the dark earth for the slightest movement of smallest ant, your heart will reach for tall mountains, bathe in the most intimate of passions and in the grain and grit of our earth. Such is Allison Grayhurst. Such is her poetry,”  Eric M. Vogt, poet and author.