two new poems...

it's nice to get the muse back, even a little...

babel and bare hands
-11/10/11-

there were some beautiful moments
at that ol' Tower of Babel...
but it was always going to fall.
and since then,
we've been separated by words
and a thin veneer of failure.


and i need you to tell me
that fallen things can be rebuilt
and constructed things can be torn down
with eager, bare hands.
but you don't exist to me.
not yet.

when we meet,
in the wreckage of that idolatrous tower,
i will know you
by your eager, bare hands
and you will know me
by my words.

the Revolution is a terrible place
to look for love.
because why would you love a woman
when the Revolution's coming?

why am i looking for you
in my weakness
when my strength awaits me
outside this modern-day Babylon?

i think it's because scattered tribes
always count their dead
on the one hand
and their missing
on the other.

we know where our dead are.
it's the missing who make us wander.
i have gone far in search of you
and your eager, bare hands.
the Revolution is coming, love.
we have things to build.

***********************************

poor Icarus
-11/16/11-

our mothers always told us
not to look directly at the sun.
our fathers always lit fires for us
so the flames wouldn't lick our fingers.
but it is parents, not children,
who are hurt most by incendiary heat.

Poor Icarus!
his story and sad, broken wings
spawned a thousand parental nightmares.
what if our children fall?
what if they follow us to the sun
but we've given them
the wrong coordinates?

there are so many things in this world
that may kill them
and so few things
that may save them.

but the children remain unaware
of this unspoken anxiety on their behalf.
they continue to throw themselves down rabbit holes,
step nimbly over landmines,
kiss the wrong people,
make all the wrong choices,
some of them twice.

fire does not phase them.
it is their nature
to dance this closely
to the edge of the sun.
they will never know
how close they came to burning.