| R o b e r t B e r o l d |
| the present tense a boomslang stretches out to probe a nest. a cloud of birds surrounds it, frantic. it slinks across to eat its prey moves on to another tree. springs into the branches cuts the light in two remembers nothing. *** on the highway to karatara on golden wires the swallows sit flat folded at the end of day at the turnoff to the third gate the light is so intense the insects blink upon the forest floor. *** the light goes down in thick air we are alone in the long together days and nights. we have worked made love, absorbed each other. a sea pull draws us closer. we navigate bruised memory by rhythms, patches of light, stories told and not told. *** the lecturer's last class was passionate : do what you believe in do what you have to. the students file out for the holiday into the sun of their horizon to beaches bars to think of infancy of body be my baby close to you don't go the sand is *** young men whose fury bursts the engines of their anger old men who reap the harvest of their anger who will survive? who will survive? who will survive, and how? who will, when the harvest comes, survive? *** thus rode the wounded warrior into the city where the roads are parallel and straight into infinity rode the faithless hero on his talking horse to the edge of time where the gravity tracks bend to vast stars burning up eternity *** she was depressed beyond belief, her life a mess. his place was lit with relief. she arrived with twitters of hope. if she was younger there would be a child. for now it was sufficient to embrace the present tense. *** filter in, grass. hide the lonely king. extract indigo from the sky. flood his cells with fire. thunderclouds hurry break his summer body his decipherable heart into a thousand pieces. *** sunbirds zither impossible scales. who can explain why the earth is beautiful, how beauty works to say -- here, move over here? the tree's swirl covers up our eyes our nerves stretch out to paradise which breathes between the suffering. |