the bleeding horse at the edge of the forest
ice in the river and the plastic bags in
tree branches and if you
call it silence
then you need to be prepared
if you drive north
the mountains begin to drift apart
the fields
which understand fences
which understand the ease of being lost
with no hope of ever getting found
and the girl was eleven i think
when she disappeared
and this was fifteen years ago
my girlfriend was pregnant and
the road went nowhere
went past an empty house with a
starving dog chained to
a tree in the front yard and i
didn’t stop
i considered how deep
the hole would need top be dug
how many times I’d have to
tell the story before it
lost all meaning
before it ended up being who i was
unfinished film about prison
standing there on the rim of the valley
at the edge of the highway
and silent
emptiness and fear and
in the distance (in any direction)
a city
buildings where they sway and collapse
and huts made of straw and
the promise of burning witches
the smell of it
and the heat
like hope but
safer
on the occasion of my four year-old son learning how to draw a peace sign
I am sitting here
thinking about sitting here
thinking about the photos of
all of those paintings of Krasner's
that no longer exist
I am thinking
of course
about Pollock
about myself and my wife
and our children
the need for beauty
in the face of pain
and I'm reading a letter
sent to me by a woman I know
something about a crack addict
beaten by her boyfriend
about the baby she gave birth to
I am reading the part where
she writes this story makes me
think of you
and what I feel is tired
what I refuse to believe in
is America
the strip malls
and the funeral homes
and the bloodthirsty smiles of
politicians
the carefully trimmed nails on
the hands of the priests who have
raped your sons and daughters
and I am sitting here thinking
about all of the unpaid bills
on the kitchen counter and about
how the walls of this house
hold no heat
I am waiting
for one war to begin or for
another to begin
for the first soldiers
to be flown home in bags
the words
spoken over their graves
which none of us will
remember
blood in the spaces between what we say and what we mean
crows in an empty field
not the idea
but the fact of it
the sky with a
beginning and an end
the earth moving
beneath your feet and thick with
the bones of indians and
slaves
anywhere
whatever day it is in
whatever year
and all of the unpaid bills that
keep you tied to this life
all of the people you've hurt
who'd like to see you dead
the names you've forgotten and
the lovers you've betrayed
and the trees all bare
the sound of the freeway
the smell of cold engines
going to rust
of the rivers filled
with oil and sludge
America at this exact moment
a woman beaten unconscious
and left in the closet of a burning house
and the simple fact that I've
outlived Cobain
have outlived Christ and
that I refuse to die like Pilate
and what about this
eighteen year old girl naked
except for a string of pearls?
how many wars are you
willing to wage just to own her?
not action
but the act of demand it
from others
all of these young men shot dead
for reasons that have more
to do with money than freedom
all of these songs with
words but no meaning
it was never enough
just knowing how to hate
the well of knowledge
they kill the father
and then his eight year-old son
which makes sense
if you want to rule out the
possibility of vengeance
they kill the mother
but not before they rape her
they save the daughter for
another day
halcyon
so tell it straight
then,
without the false romance of
distance and loss
you were in love
and then you weren’t
you lost each other
found each other again maybe
then waited to see what
would happen
got by for a while on
sex and fear and memories
and then it wasn’t enough
closed your eyes and
when the morning light forced
them open again
ten years had passed
you were both
married to strangers
you were both lost in
the forest
the edges had already
begun to burn
* * * * * *
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