as the sky falls into the melody of another fiery evening, i am listening to a soft strong voice glide out from the radio. this voice believes in something i am trying to understand. in beauty, in tenderness, in the promise of the ocean glittering at midday. i am alone and clammed by air too warm for February. removing my shirt and my shoes, rubbing the aches in my bare feet. the rich smoothness in the voice’s words becomes the body of a man i wonder if i’d ever have had the courage to become.
birds are floating up above the catch of gray trees and the sun crawls lower into the belly of this lonely planet. i watch the people on tv streaming live, grasping, desperate for hope which has all but escaped them. what would you offer us, and who would you like us to pretend to be. how is the daily bread to be made when suffering comes in stinging waves without relent. the amount of pain they carry, we carry, i carry, the little ones carry. how will we get out of here. how will we get on in this graveyard nightmare game.
there is a gun and there is a child. the gun is cradled, sheltered, protected. and the human fabric shreds itself from the outside in. we pull apart our hearts and they are full of small bones, of vigils, of lead.
the distant radio mouth is still weighted with song. it sings the words. it breathes out and in. but there is no relief.
Allison Marie Conway 