Walking

by Louis E. Bourgeois

 

The sky a deepest gray, but moves slowly, slowly. I keep
tempting myself with these lonely streets, to wander and die.
The lights are on in the temple. God is absent, but ash
still lingers thick in the air. Emerald smoke streams
out of manholes and drifts forever like dissolving spirits
into the bronchial limbs of dark oaks and maples.
I stand against the temple. All my life I've worn black
for Him, and He does not respond. Thoughts linger for too long,
thoughts of childhood in Louisiana. Grey bones in abundance
in the dry ditches. Armadillo and nutria bones.
For too long I have lived in a world that doesn't know my name.
The sky is mauve now, and I pass the shops. Plastic heads displayed,
and even more lifeless, the people, looking into windows of empty dreams.
I walk faster, and the wind against my back reminds me of home--
some thirty years ago, still whimpering in the womb. They plan
executions better than they prepare for all who enter and stay
lonely forever. A light is being snuffed out in my mouth.
The sky is black now and has quit moving. Keep thinking
of the hills, I whisper, and the mesmerizing geese that always
flew too high above the blind, and the perpetually grey father
smoking cigars and drinking whisky, muttering back then too much into my
ears than was good for me. Remember the fields, I whisper,
and the blue and white herons that flew up before you and disappeared.

 

©2005 Louis E. Bourgeois

Louis E. Bourgeois is an instructor of English at Rust College. His most recent collection of poems, OLGA, was just released by WordTech. He lives on a farm in North Mississippi where he is completeing a short story collection called The Gar Diaries. His website is www.voxjournal.com.