i. Morning:
                         On the Edge of Immortality

Grab a rope
tie a noose
meet me out
by the spruce
in the field
where we bury doubt, in
the field near the old road
and we will figure out

how it all
came to this
as we give
up our Selves
to the cause
offering what feels lost
this crippling winter of
not even caring if

we get past
injustice
or just keep
craving its
relentless
raping of open minds
enabling crowds taking
advantage of our kind.

               ii. Noon:
                         Where the Willow Does Not Weep

Of moments
not rolling
years, man’s made
for himself
flowing forth
from the last into the
next, a broken path of
patterns bleeding pace out

of sprinters
wintering
in petty
wilderness
inspiring
heady poets to print
chronicles more often
erased from the pages

time mistakes
for a meal
devouring
with all of
heretic
zeal life itself, in bites
less desirable than
winning its fixed races.

               iii. Night:
                         The Killing Tree

Lord help us
if we fail
to see where
all of this
is leading
but just lift us up there
onto its canopy
of withered fruit and drop

down each my
brothers and
my Self, hand
fire to our
guts and let
us hold o’er ground what’s best
withheld from the crowd’s touch
string us up like puppets

frowning at
idiots
please take this
all in stride
since we put
to the test your blindest
audience, and beg you
pardon our crimes of lives.