The Faces We See

November 8^th, 2010

Come and go with the rain but

One face never leaves us.

Through the hurricane’s winds,

Was your hand with mine,

Battling long and strong,

but torn apart near the end.

Though shingles were ripped

Shutters unhinged,

Windows torn down

The flume left abridged,

Skylights added in new

Pine-wood living rooms,

This face holds on steady

To the day it’s faded

When to all others it

Is hidden unto itself.

In mountains and valleys

Streams run as joys and pains,

Geoclines folded to match.

Hills of trees and vines obscure

And bind the fathomless caves

That had given the depth of recognition

To a plane as uniform as coastal.

Through time it confided

Enlivened

And sated

Now keeps me in view

Of young energy askew.

Without hope to function

In the slow, sudden death

Of independence,

A world gone dead by its doings,

The trappings don’t hold,

Let drain,

Identities, memories, me.

As I stand on the cleft

The earth opens wide

To engulf me at last.

Let the forests burn grey.

Let the magma spew and cool.

Let the plates finish collisions

Building continents, mountains and dunes.

For the outer firmaments

Does the last breath flee

And the view, to infinity,

As the foundations slow

Their gears of metal

Manacles finally release

Setting me free.

Then a new face is found

In fields of tall fescue

Spying faces come back

Among bison, returned,

Numbering millions upon

A land with great breadth,

Water clear as the sky

As defined as ambition,

Lit by fusion’s fresh flirtings

Raising plants by their own

In soil deeper than roots,

Darker without addition,

Charged beyond demand,

On the earth, like new,

Such color,

Where we meet again.