Days Without Water

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My arms grow weary

under the wheel

Skulls in my pockets

and a mountain up ahead

with flesh and jaw bone

extended

 

I search for his airborne heart

in the crevices of clouds

 

I search for his pure

brave gaze in the way

birds with wing graze

the edge of each rainbow, anew

 

I walk into autumn’s

darkening rays, lonely

as the architecture of church walls,

lonely as the light

in the half-closed eyes

of children

 

I think again of his thin fingers

exhaling tenderness in every blind curve touch

 

He is milk & wind

He is nowhere

to be found

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Copyright © 1995 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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Translated into Portuguese by Eric Ponty and posted on FaceBook, April 2025

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1A98ZfgnP9/

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First published in the “White Wall Review”, 1992

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below: