The New Life
I woke in the middle of a wooded
trailer park (in the middle
of somebody’s lies), lying mired in a muddle
about where I was, with nothing
I could call my own: no shoes, no shirt, no pants,
no socks, no job or occupation, income
none. Wrecked mobile homes
on either side hinted at ruin
come and gone astray, what might return
for dinner, bringing friends
and friends of friends. The earth dressed down
in withered grasses and crashed trees, pine straw
and rusted household appliances,
made a welcome for me, made a grave
to mock me back to sleep. Raw sunlight
ignited my dissolving bones,
buried me alive in my disintegrating
body. How long it takes not to move.
My tarnished-penny idioms discoloring
unfinished loam, knife-edged
and neverward, I decided
not to die that day, made my mobility
my theme: stood up to red-clay dust
and downed corrugated fencing, uncollected
with the other storm debris.
Published MiPOesias Magazine 2007
Filed under: Flashback, MIPOesias
