Fiction, Poetry, Nonfiction, Photography and Photo Art
Some days
I think they are right, the ones
who fear the world outside,
taking aim at
all things different.
Perhaps there is an order that must be
maintained,
worshiped,
revered.
Perhaps there is an absolute
scheme
of things where some don’t fit,
like pieces found in the wrong puzzle box.
Perhaps there is.
Sometimes the feet are unwilling,
caught between fear and desire,
shadow and light.
So they stay,
immovable,
staking a claim to one spot as if that
will make
everything right.
Adolescents are the ones who get it
right, relishing
the graphic image as they cling together,
so close,
and whisper, “Oh, gross…”
Guts
and blood are undeniable
as are fingers, eyeballs, liver and kidney.
What have souls
and such to do with the body,
the words,
reduction and reproduction?
Even the phoenix only rises from the ashes
to become its fleshy self
once again.
The mockingbird’s song
clinks and slides against the glass,
rebuffed
by retreat
into each cloistered night.
Peace lurks like a ghost
in shrouded
corners of light.
I stood below and watched them come.
Only a few at first, winged silhouettes
that swirled and dipped their way across the sky.
Then more appeared and joined the few, a shadow
cloud above my head.
I have come
to hold myself like a stone
on the dry palm
of my upturned hand,
to comfort myself
with a calloused thumb.
A story exists. You know, the one where you fall in
love (once
upon that time),
the one where she comes
through
the door
and occupies your bed.
Not a prince to test you with some silly shoe
but a femme in fancy dress
whose lust is all
for you.
You carry
a huge black piano
through the streets.
It fell from the sky.
You caught it
and did not
crumple
like the cat
you once saw in a cartoon.
You caught it
and stayed straight.
You carry it home
each day.
You’ve come back
to the rooms of our house
where speech died
and a breathing stone filled our bed.
It was getting hot that did it,
the way the sweat gathered at the back
of her neck and between her thighs,
how the sun stayed in the sky
day after day
so that only her tears would dry.
Karen Lee Kleis 