With a Machete.

I walk sleeplessness
like a bean field in summer;
through weeds growing wild

out of furrowed thoughts,
once planned and planted in rows;
now, sickled off short.

Into morning dreams
frost crawls, over ridge and rut;
and I go again,

to walk sleeplessness
like a bean field in summer;
through weeds growing wild.

Places I've Been

(Lyrics from an old song.)

Sitting here all alone

Wondering where the time has gone

I’m waiting, for someone

To take me away...

Home to the waving fields

The places I’ve been;

Too numerous to count

In my dreams.

The shadows are getting longer

As the yellow face sinks under the sea.

The world darkens

And I want to go...

Home to the waving fields

The places I’ve been;

Too numerous to count

In my dreams.

Lonely before I never have been

People, always people all around me,

When all I really want is for you to take me...

Home to the waving fields

The places I’ve been;

Too numerous to count

In my dreams.

Caroling.

Haunting thoughts, midnight

with past, present and future

hopes; dissipating

scrooged, at sunrise.

On the Wall.

A picture, outlined by starlight

hangs the night;

like a black hole, framed and endless;

through the dark

I travel, sleepless...

Through eyelets.

The wind whispers

like a father, always right;

but, never believed.

"Falling won't hurt this time."

I listen, lacing up boots...

A slivered face.

He walked with me, westward

across the sky, disappearing

home behind mountains;

yet, he lingered

like a porch-light, turned on,

lengthening...

the steps before me.

Hypolimnion.

My stomach churns

like a pond, turning over

in autumn, seasoned bottom layers

die, and rise green

with stratified breaths, they reach

sunlit rays of drought; baking

memories, which flake as golden crusts

into a heron's open beak.