Sacraments – S.M.H.

July 18, 2019

The Mourning Hour

 

In the mourning hour
I tossed
in the wracking
of nightmare
I turned
in the confusion
of sleep
I chattered my teeth
my jaw became sore
my jaw grew knots
thick as ship rope
in the mourning hour
I burn the effigy of my faith
in the mourning hour
I burn the effigy of my faith
in the mourning hour
I see things plain
I see
the soreness
of Being
I see
the grinding of mouth
the faint
trickle of
light
blood

 

The Nothing

 

sun pale in the winter cold
grey clouds
drifting across a cobalt sky
grey clouds
vomited
from the mouth of an eerie God
When you strain
to hear the honey of his voice
what returns
is the faint beating of your heart
and the void of sky and plain
the awful silence of the canyons
the hard pit
in the center `
of the throat
this is the truth
of God’s silence
you were born to rest
in the bosom of confusion
and to fatten on the milk
of loss
and at the end
of your days
you will be met
with nothing
but the nothing
at the end

 

Dream

 

(i do not care how many dead in this shifting breeze)
their guts dried
smooth shaft of
pestle
grinds them
to powder
/////powder snorted ////
now high
in sticky
land of swamp
sun  draining
in
evening amber
in
pink loss of life
land perfumed fear
in the trauma of burn
dream melts
in agonizing color
distorted
in the jelly of sleep
(i woke up from this dream with my mouth full of blood)

 

Scrying

 

there is more blood in a person than you would think
I saw the goose
neck broken in the trees
an omen of something to come
-I can not control my temper
-this is not a judgement, it is a prayer
I saw a dead fox lying in the road
entrails making map
of the hot sticky world of pavement
I gathered up the fur
orange like the sun
and I whispered into it
I said things about the planet
loosening
unraveling string, guts, long intestines
spreading ears eyes mouth lips pits
anuses pubis belly button
every orifice you could get caught in
speaking the language of the vipers
yelling into the dancing snakes
in the church
in the holler
way back in the dense oak and hardwood
if they bite
heaven will save
if you believe
you will dance
if you believe
you will dance with them
the creek is coming up to my waist
I go down
I go down praying

 

Water

 

I wish the sucking of lungs
the prayer of water beating against
the hard plate of skull
against the turquoise sky
against the mostly silent rocks
body
gushing to disappear in the moving
body of water that is
clear and now
gone