Cure

Joy is but a minstrel’s flower,

lightening under the thumbnails.

Preach of mud around the eyes,

myself a centipede, fast but fragile.

I gaze and I know the way is a path is a dream

of a hawk landing and inside that dream

anguish quickens to gold, despair into

overcoming. Inside that dream, Jesus stands

insistent in a child’s purity, burdenless, fresh

as the sun always is and always burning.

A tiny stone that cannot break, a love so graced

it welcomes the flooding tide. But I am broken,

eaten in tiny increments by the changing mirror –

around the evenings, around the first day’s light,

blind to all but the persistent churning.

Jesus’ great love has left me weeping,

suffering mended, miracles under

a white desert sky, offering a gift

seemingly small, unassuming,

but full enough to prevent heartache’s

lasting damage.

Copyright © 2022 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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Published in “Creation and Criticism” December 2023

http://www.creationandcriticism.com/cure-and-other-poems-by-allison-grayhurst.html

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First published in “Synchronized Chaos” May 2022

https://synchchaos.com/synchronized-chaos-second-may-issue/

https://synchchaos.com/poetry-from-allison-grayhurst-13/

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

Direction

Can this moment be a fruit,

a moist secret, picked and juiced?

Can I follow through with my leap of faith

and leap into the coal fires of survival’s uncertainty,

be selfish as the hunter who conserves nature

so he can have enough nature to kill

and make into wall trophies?

Am I a dead mouse on the porch who made it

as far as the first freeze, forgot

to build a nest and suffered the consequences?

Am I fortunate as the found street dog,

given kibble, a warm place to lay,

a pack to call her own?

Am I here maimed but alive,

like all things living,

crippled by the weight of time?

Why is everything half-formed?

Only young things leap and frolic,

free because of their dependency

on maternal sustenance and protection.

My endurance is threadbare.

If I wash and wear it one more time

it will disintegrate and not hold form.

I know nothing but

I do know Jesus –

the bridge and the tunnel below.

I know one way, one path

all else is

phantom blood, phantom fulfilment,

just renderings humming ‘yes yes –

take my false face as truth,

count my money, my grand accomplishments,

my soft seats, my high seats,

my triple thaw and my double freeze.’

The butcher is a psychopath. The liars are in charge.

Steady now, the hand, the moon dangling on a string,

say your necessary farewells.

Jesus is walking, walk with him,

eyes forward, summoned.

Copyright © 2022 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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.

First published in “Synchronized Chaos” May 2022

https://synchchaos.com/synchronized-chaos-second-may-issue/

https://synchchaos.com/poetry-from-allison-grayhurst-13/

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

Darkness

Darkness heavy as a hunter’s

footsteps, as a sermon

up the sleeve, offered like

a ripe strawberry covered in ants.

Darkness like the green

on a last slice of bread

or the dome of pollution that mutes

Earth from the zodiac hymns.

Darkness that binds

thumbtacks to the temples,

dirty as a campfire after the fire

or a marriage after infidelity.

Darkness as a shell, hardness

masquerading as strength, terrors

of complexities, moral confusion

and the allotment of grief that mushrooms

in tiny pockets here, here, until all greenery

is overcome with fungi.

Darkness that holds no peace,

no joy in just breathing,

makes up myths and ceremonies

to try to blast out

the darkness, flaking at the core.

Darkness I am done with your engulfing disease,

your canopy wings, trickery, making me believe

there is rest and safety in your shade.

I lay down my fossils and my weeping.

Darkness, I blow you over

and when I am blown over,

I will offer no resistance.

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Copyright © 2022 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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First published in “Ink Pantry” June 2022

lhttps://www.inkpantry.com/poetry-drawer-egg-darkness-resilience-declaration-fish-chain-child-by-allison-grayhurst/

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below: