Where All Rainbows End

reflecting on your own emptiness.

I'm here, where all rainbows end.

I'm in the place where the songbirds go mute.

Beyond the place in the road where deer are stunned by headlights.

Out in Death Country,

          the lasso got tangled 'round my neck.

Sitting on the half-rotted porch of a trailer

where I used to live,

where people used to stop by, drink, smoke, laugh, argue,

                and hurt each other.

A long time ago, when I lived with a different woman. And didn't love her.

The burdock grows high here beside the steps,

offering up the little bulbs of thorns, for sympathy.

They're a co-dependant plant, desiring to attach

those velcro clusters

      to my jeans and socks and sleeves,

      the back of my shirt.

The wind still blows empty here,

    like all the horrible volumes of some invisible ocean

    cascading through the trees out back.

I lay on my back against the broken sun-bleached boards

and stare into the dial-tone of hopeless, empty blue

                          above,

        my ashtray over my heart,

        its rim balanced like some translucent halo.

Smoking.

         And blowing it into the breeze.

My life dissipates.

My heart beats.

Bump. Bump.

Bump. Bump.

No     Work

No     Car

No     Cares

No     Love.

Bump.

Bump.

Should I rip out these old petrified bones from this porch?

And hammer together a guillotine?

Should I synch a noose,

      rasp it through the crotch of a tree?

It'll end up empty, swaying there for days---

      a reminder of dead, unfinished thoughts.

Should I go home, run a bath?

Shuffle though the envelopes packed in my mailbox,

    sentenced there by bill collectors.....?

The tin red flag has been up all week

    on my black mailbox of death.

Should I keep trying?

None of these, nor other questions, are answered

when I pick up and swish through the overgrowth around

         my old deserted porch.

The burdock swoons

and fixes its little minions to my pant legs,

clusters them around the tops of my socks.

Reviews

[jacob erin-cilberto]

this is a perfect look back from the perspective of "what happened to me?"

"where did my life go" or "where have all the good times gone"

a 60's person like me relates to this...and how it was...as you know i often write about this....

this is realism, this is beat poetry at its finest.

jacob

[spiritwind]

Oh my word!
This is the best rad I have done today and for many a day
Your talent knows no boudaries
I am never disappointed--never left empty or merely half filled.
You deliver!

[Frieda P]

Interesting read, if only there a 'delete' button for real life...

[Becca Bishop]

The worst thing about the past is that we can't do anything to change it! I definitely wouldn't have guessed you such a talent for writing things like this!! It's haunting and thought-provoking and wonderful. I love (this goes for all your writing, not just this piece) that the lines are all broken up and different lengths. It's more like a story that way, something that sticks with you. Poems are all well and good, but the stories are makes a person....do....something. I don't know. Just lost it!!! Great job :) :) :) :) :)

[James William Dyer]

thx so much I appreciate hearing that. I work so much I hardly have a chance to get on here anymore.

[Becca Bishop]

That's a bummer :( Well...at least your jobs fun, right :D :D :D :D Unless your a trash collector. I don't think they have much fun. Good thing you aren't a trash collector!!!

[KAOlmsted]

This piece is going to haunt me for a very long time, I think. Revisiting a former life, it's impossible to not see the ghosts that inhabit it. Your writing is, as always, impeccable, and the style with which you use that writing leaves me wanting more, all the while knowing you've given me the exact dose. Thank you for sharing this with us.

[Balkaran Sidhu]

I don't have words to say how good this poem is...

[eglantine]

Nice first line. I'd take out "the" in the second line and "in the road" in the third line. We know it's in the road because of the "headlights". Why are "Work...Car....Cares.. Love" capitalized? I see no need for that.

Strong last three lines, nice.

Thanks for sharing.

[James William Dyer]

I'll consider it. The capitalization is to emphasize importance and to continue the thudding sound of the heart. "in the road", despite the headlights, because a road has huge mental implications, the word does, to a reader, it implies a path in life, a way of travel, a course, a decision, all those things and to extricate the word also de-emphasizes those latent meanings....but maybe not. I'll have to see

[Horizon K.]

Wow, such a beautiful way to express emptiness & desolation. I've been reading The Lorax a lot recently and it reminds me of "the far end of town where the Grickle-grass grows...."
Definitely my favorite of yours so far.

[Lushan]

I'd love to hear you read this. It's perfect as a spoken poem.

[Pratik]

Brilliant and dark... Sometimes in life one gets stuck in these moments that suffocates, not allowing you to escape.... Your poem demystifies this virtual world... Your vivid imagery and brilliant metaphors make this an excellent work :)