To a Dying Woman.

I thought it was when we were young
    That we had to hear the words...

 "Where does it hurt...
       Where does it hurt?"

Ocean Floor

And they told us…
that his footsteps went straight into the water
and no one followed after
except a ghost called lust

And we wanted to follow
we wanted to know his name
why was he ashamed?
What didn’t he want us to know

They saw his body floating belly-up
and we could tell by his eyes
that he had seen the ocean floor

And then we knew
he lusted after what he didn’t know
and what he didn’t know was that lust followed him
into the water

And it pushed him under
and it made his eyes bulge
and it made him go further
even though his insides did explode
his arms still propelled him
to see the beast beneath
the great amorphous behemoth
that encompassed the underneath
of every drop of water
every counted sin
his eyes saw the droplets
evaporate beneath its fins

As it moved the world with each breath
beneath its body lied the place of death

The fires eating the flesh

We wanted to go into the water
and see the breathing floor
see how it pushed and pulled
the waves across the shore

See how it coaxed and taunted
the dreams of all man
see how it deeply wanted
to crawl upon the land.


This poem was also featured on Randomly Accessed Poetics on 04/01/2012

A Street for the Dead