R
E / V
E R A

2 00 7

Shoeless
Faceless
Glaring
in the pale shadow
of an eternal light.

A hand shakes off the dust,
yet again it settles
upon a brow.

==

The shackles of love
bind
like calligraphy
upon a page.

==

A prayer, reclusive,
breaches the heavenly summit
where mercy
clings amid the twilight.

-

A yawn
overtakes a breath.
An apology
awaits another rendition.
Graceful gestures
liquefy into dew.

==

Amongst my friends
I rise like a totem.
Alas, into the trenches
I now call my home.

I soak in the soil
as it cleanses me of my sins.
Reborn, I recline bare,
naked without a whim.

A man they once called me,
yet so much I neglected to prove.
Now I know how to be that man,
as truth begins to envelope me.

==

The darkness
blankets
days muted,
words muffled.

—

Fleeing—
there goes the soul,
such abandonment.
Yet the body
remains intact.

—

These limbs
belong to another,
and my palm is wet
with hesitation.

—

Who am I,
the speaker
of verse?

—

A child of hope,
perhaps,
or of wantonness?

==

Silent
besotted,
deprived of a voice.

Love tackles me
to my knees.

—

I begin again
with another familiar story,
but my mind recoils
from speaking.

==

And so life goes on
without the daily remedy
of purification.

The night proves hard to defeat
as hours pass, mimed and hollow.

—

Dreams vaporize,
and dawn begins its charge
toward all those at hand:

believers
of faith or fortune,
arise—be summoned.

==

Wrenching
at the possibility
of happiness

Quenching
the thirst
that never satiates

Melting
into the superficiality
of it all

Splitting
the minutest of details
that life summons

Rendering
a true belief
false

Alas,
to be me
is to be someone else.