Whatever Stops You From Leaving
Forks ‘stead of spoons– an upright imp, a herd.
“I wish, when I close my eyes, everybody closes theirs, too,
So we could all enjoy the darkness that glimmers. That glimmers
Far beyond our limbs and far beyond our homes.
“Our bones, they stutter– our cowardly, heralded.
There is no better route than having to escape the cave with ye.
No better feature creature than what’s in yer belly.”
“People are sturdy things. People are fragile things.
They criticize and contribute to darkness alike, pray to our gods in darkness alike.”
“I pray only for ye.”
“Do you see them?” “I see them. I do not like them watching me.”
“I have lain with a soul so pure yet so afraid to feel.
They robbed our asses, robbed our
Failures of a future.
I would have wished to let you rob again.
Our years together are our years apart–
Simply depending on simple ways of existing–
Our fasts, our complementaries–
They could not trick that from us.”
A clanker of regret.
“…He looked so young. I do not want to be responsible
For taking the world from him, the way these horrible bunyips
Hath laughed to take up
Mine.”
The Bard whispered to his casual burglar the real birth curse–
His last playing card, the final totem, the name–
His greatest gambit to keep a lover awake
And, more impossibly, to keep a lover from leaving.