Bound Before

The earth breathes below the surface.
A fire that pulls in time to the churning belly of the sun.
The lull of the green, and the water a temporary facade;
that covers an army of riotous chariots.
Black smoke breathed cloaked whisperers,
holding flowers that have long since
lost their colour.
Stolen from the graves
of the forgotten.
Faceless but all too familiar,
they sing lullaby after lullaby.
Come you two, come sit in the
ash drawn hop-scotch and learn. Learn
how to peel back the layers of voices that will
follow you like black birds while you play.
While you live. While you cry.
While you weep over your interpretation of love,
and what it should be.
Study each other’s faces.
They will be the familiar threads of colour
that guide you through when the wind blows
and when the night falls.
Gather up your earth, and your bones, and your feathers and your totems.
Gather up your copper and your skin shavings and your medicines
of the ancestors;
for you two
will be well versed in hell’s finer
etiquette before you meet again on the other side.
And you will recognise each other.
The thread will be visible and clear.
The path will not.

They spoke truth. I found her hardened blue eyes,
and stood in awe at the trail of blackbirds that
followed her small frame as she came towards me.
Her armour, like mine, a mind ablaze, in time to the churning belly
that’s clock is as relentless as the belly of the sun.
Her weapons lowered long enough to embrace me;
she remembered my face.

Born of the earth and below.
No journey is a journey without the familiar face
of my J, and the blackened sky of ravens that
hover not far above. A trail, if you will,
of what was.