Poetry Becomes You

Poetry
For those who don’t know
Haiku from pentameter
Should be something
Itching in the mind
A blip on inner radar
A rock on the path
Tripping you hard
Into elsewhere

Slicing memory
Sticking behind the eyes
Haunting
Shoving you from the familiar
To a strange perspective
Suddenly, utterly, your own
All of this a poem should do
All of this.
Or none

Some poems simply are.
Their words whisper only for you
Entering softly, unseen
Taking horizon within
Altering forever

Poetry becomes you.

all day the snow fell

All day the snow fell
Staying in the quiet places
On northern slopes, deep, shaded
The rest vanished into the sodden ground
As your words vanished in the air
Only their cold lingered

Is that what you believed?
Truth could change and none would know?
Love could be unchangeable
Trust could never be lost?
You believed you could lie to me

Snow touches faces, melting into tears
Hot salt, cold ice, all becoming one
Did you know I kept your letters?
Did you ever pause, watching the sky for a change
Did you believe no storm could touch you?

By dusk it was rain, gray sheets, like a shroud
Your words were ashes, the last curling in the fire
I walked away.
rain around me like armour
Snow remaining in the hidden places as a shield


When night fell, the rain ceased
Stars in my future
And you in my past.

Spring always comes, the sun always rises
The truth remains, shining.