Part III · The Des Moines / Post-Military Era (2000–2015)
Footfalls echo off the asphalt.
The moon is hidden behind clouds so thick
Even they are invisible.
The stars beyond shine unseen, oblivious to the
Activity beneath their celestial realm.
Birds are disturbed by noises barely heard by their sources,
And express their dismay by flying frantically around
Their perches until returning to their rest moments later,
The recent intrusions already forgotten.
Black ice invites peril to the unwary, and the
White snow-covered land seems to glow of its own accord.
The font of every sound reveals itself to the
Discerning observer, and even time itself
Slows to a deathly cadence.
The wind is surrealistic, profoundly tangible to my ears,
Wounding them with its harsh bite and bellow.
My mind wanders beyond the limits of my body,
Traveling the realms through time,
Bringing back with it images from my past:
The scents and sensations of experience,
Where innocence tarnished and guilt
Took its first breath of air and exhaled foulness,
To eventually be cleansed by someone’s forgiveness
And another’s forgetfulness.
Someone’s smile and another’s tears.
Both helped birth new hopes and new fears.
Laughter and pain, the proud and insane.
Where are the tears when you cry in the rain?
Six shots and five beers, the tumultuous cheers,
Inmates in prison who might once have been peers.
Didactic commissars, stools to their own rules,
Just like the liar who feeds his own fire
While fighting the blaze; and amazed by the haze
In the maze of his ways wanders lost in his own wonder.
When will you take that step that will trigger the mine?
When the tell-tale click gives you a moment
Of eternity to appraise your life and
Decide if you played it or it played you?
Composed 2002 · part of the Poems collection · authorship documented on the Provenance page.