pilgrimage

we trek this earth
shedding
nothing but the fragments
of our minds,
our hearts,
our youth
on alters constructed
of everything we have lost.

we deem these in memorials,
a conglomerate of symbols
stacked in bricks
on locations
painted
with the patterns
of our blood.

this is never silent,

it's only the noises
we create
when we backtrack
the footprints we have made.

wilderness survival

all this is
is paths,
and all we have
is the company of strangers.

and it's so easy for you
to grab a hand
like it's nothing
but
a piece of wood
for the fire.

your hand is a match.

it's so scenic
at the head of the path,
nothing but the face of god
in sunsets, and
the rocks just seem to glow.

everything is sucked in by the eyes
of a beautiful bloom.

and on we go,
further,

until there are clouds
charging like horses in war.
the storm feels like it'll never
end,
and you believe it.

if you make a left,
over that rickety bridge,
you can start on a different path,
but you have to promise
to set the bridge on fire
at the end
of the cross,

and you do.
that bridge only has the strengh to hold
one more.

you take it.
you take the backpack
with the supplies
and left us there
with nothing
but the bruises
of thunder and lightning.

you even had the strengh
to not look back
because
a new stranger
is always waiting for you.

but we survived.

we survived
knowing that storms
eventually ends.

we aren't the only ones.

shuffling comes first

roads upon roads,
stacked up
in easy piles
of neat.

then
a foot comes along,
blind,
trampling the roads
like a house of cards.

everything scatters.

intersecting cards
have the reaction of bombs,
everywhere.

face up,
face down,
somehow connecting and
pulling apart,
all within the space
of a single breath,

and
there is no regard
to forming any sense,

just an absolute
in continuation.

a duel

one voice explains
why
you're a dummy.
another voice
makes you believe
that
you're filtering
the thought patterns
of god.

but really,
most times,
a bottle
of wine
is
the deciding factor.

you interpret
why they hate you,
why
they laminate you
into something that fits.

we are only
the consumption of shapes.

somebody
once lied to you
in the explanation
of the word forever,

but still,
you believe in a theory
that will never end.

and it's not until
that arc,
on that circle is complete,
that a goddamn thing
will ever be proven.

the impatience of a vessel

in cigarettes,
enough smoke has been inhaled
to calm the nerves
of a small army.

there have been
enough drugs gathered
and heaped
into the size of a mountain,
that even a circle of recovering addicts
could never resist.

there has been enough booze
to make a lake
and float a boat.

i've wrapped the clothe
around the stick,
and dunked it
in a vat of gasoline,
handing each one of them
the matches,
while wearing nothing
but a blindfold.

and still,
through these prayers,
it's never enough
to even make
the outlines
of a face.

after the belief of honey

early on
before
the toxins of people
penetrate
the skin's pores,
you imagine two hands
completing a whole,

you were young,
just a byproduct
of beliefs
that had no holes.

you made prayers
in beads of the trinity
to the flesh,
to the story,
to the belief,

a sum of hope
that lead
to the expedition
of proof.

years later
in the inevitable landscape
of wars,
the cosmology of the word
forever
is captured
and handed
one more smoke.

the only security she left you
is handcuffs.

you understand this
in only a theory
that the guillotine
can provide.

paper trails

we comprise each day
in the form of faces
and blood
and languages
that we may
or may never understand.

we lay them down
on sheets
of loose leaf paper,
and consider each piece the sum
of one day,

we stack them by date
and consider the results
collateral.

day by day
the pile grows
faster,
reaching for an end,
a conclusion
in the form of ceilings.

the process leads to a blurr
in repetition,
until
the facts become the wind
that knock the stacks of paper
into the fragments
of oblivion.

the counterintuitiveness of horticulture

the seeds
of death
have already been planted.

the farmers
have cultivated us
in strains
of tears and empty bottles
that make
even the strongest growth
wilt
underneath the vacuum
of their shadow.

we are brought here,
miraculously empty,
fed on light
and the purity of liquids.

we grow,
open,
not even aware
of the meaning of trust.

something happens.

a farmer forgets.
a farmer has nothing left
but
contaminated water.

a farmer will slit you
for nothing more than seed,
and the only thing left to grow
is
the genetics of memory
and hope,
that the next field
is tilled
with just a little more light.