Shade of the Oak- a poem

Sheaves of carbon paper

inky black occult

imprint ability

as a whisper

and again,

mirrors scars mirrors

the smell of it, stitches, seams

words branded

her fingernails shadow

eerie orange edges

hand over flame

as fingertips burn my body

my soul,

I wrote her name in the sand

with a forefinger

I wrote her name in the snow

gloves discarded,

forefinger again

red, blue, cold as ice floes

but there it is

I wrote in ballpoint pen

dearest,

oh my dearest

written like the deep furrows in the tree trunk

grooves and gouges of love carved by the mother

in codes and symbols,

greater then all the fingertips

the eyes and knots and knobs

scarred calloused hands

and leaf veins, arterial overhead

fountaining, gushing with sun turned strength

and Nanas typewriter

clicketing and clacketing

chattering teeth as I tremble the very first time I let her touch me

my wrists like wings, curled inward

willing myself to stay where I was

tentative, terror, slow blue eyed blink,

as it overwhelmed my senses

to be what I was, as I was

and I touched her,

as she looked at me, eyes wide

“are you okay?”

“yes”

fingertips, substance, substrate,

prostrate, hallowed

and the birds fly above in the green nest of treetops

sparrows, and a cardinal

and crows flitting, feathers forever ink dipped

fanned wingspan

silently gliding as they settle and watch

half shadow spectres

fading in layers

in the net of the afternoon light

shrilling questioning whistles and squeaks

before they fly south to the pull of

arcane magnetic inner compasses

perhaps never to return

and the branches of the tree above, are vibrant and bustle

save one which is lifeless

but still on that tree like a sentinel,

brown and naked of blossoms

I dream of her,

and I ask her why

I daydream her,

looking into my eyes,

a sorrow hallucination

a kite in the sky

but there is song sun trees

and I still have my hands

my fingertips