in blue grass

[Joe Casey]

in blue grass

 

 

in blue grass i hear your

name whispered in the

secret inflections of

languages yet unlearnt.

 

in blue grass you are

the passing of day and night,

the surprise of cloud and shadow,

the motion of light in water.

 

time has marked you as

she has marked me,

we two harried and hectored,

that arrow begun her downward curve.

 

in blue grass run

these walls your bones,

these rivers your blood,

these hills your body.

•

i have forgotten myself among the

great grey towers of

cities and the streets and the

press of blank faces.

 

i have forgotten myself

in that place of dust,

have loosed my soul into

vanity and empty promise.

 

I have forgotten myself and

the custom of my youth,

my arrogant ways and

my foolish passions.

 

i am called home now by

that which I cannot face:

my mother is dying,

settling up accounts.

•

you are there one day,

family of sorts,

sharing this thing that

courses beneath our flesh.

 

a phantom, you

who stayed and whose

courage far outpaced mine,

even as I thought myself your better.

 

in blue grass you dance the

ancient dance of harvest, hunt and hearth,

casting life to ground

even as you pluck life from it.

 

we speak to each other

those mumbling things of

desire and wish and dream,

are become doer and deed.

•

in blue grass i feel the touch

of your eyes, lips, fingers,

the touch of memory,

of the past that could have been.

 

in blue grass i

lay with you and we are

become those walls, those rivers, those hills,

knit close and closer still.

 

In the secret hollows

of your stalwart body

i lose myself and am

found again.

 

in blue grass you have

come to me,

my salvation and

my redemption.

 

[Cole Parker]

What amazing imagery.  A work that comes from the soul.  Wonderful, Joe.

C 

[Merkin]

Extraordinary.  Very moving.

[Bruin Fisher]

Lovely, and touching. Thanks!