A hum in the red sky
terrible sights of deathless tract homes
detached people quiet
around their long dining table
front yards at day
St-Augustine lawn
shivers in silent
madness
he opens the trunk and puts in the bags
curtains stir where
rifts form
always a plot
and a parallel romance
he runs to the cities
he has bigger visions.
He visits gangs in the meadow.
From crumbling shelters
of bored youth,
the sigh of a certain train in the distance-
Shapes form on their closed eyelids.
In empty lots, they shout
and pound the earth,
they try to be heard.
Mischief under cold
summer lamp posts.
Cloud breaths rise,
alone again,
out from their metal coffins.
The vast exalted sky
blasting through the tight tainted venues-
Raindrops stroke the window
of the empty bar. Tables soiled
with stacked ancient hearts-
A first sip from his drink.
Drowned out rings,
distant whispers,
a tempted calm.
A barmaid stares-
Under the cadence,
slow and dreamy,
something is changing.
They eye each other for a moment
Skipping engine, determined-
hair waving in the aimless gust
of a troubled Norther horizon.
Evening drive down Lone Star boulevards,
through Latin notes and voices,
youth kicking ball on public playground
near the sidewalk,
on the outskirts,
passing boots and buried dreams on
porches of roadhouses & dusky motels.
Sudden rain on tropic concrete
familiar smells,
neon discussions-
hair wet and dripping down the leather seat,
a newcomer on the other.
Soon the country hills surface in the sweet bleak moment of
new union and all is left behind.
//
New dawn coffee & breakfast
staring in the whites,
faint blues notes of
lost desert moments;
tanned angels surrounding
in native tongue;
blazing sand
/eyes.
For dialects of addiction,
fellow loss
of purpose, soul and truth;
they stood on the side of the road,
choosing the soft
taxidermy of youth.