Dead Ends



I
don’t
think
so

I
I
don’t

ch- ch- ch-
chuckling
ch- ch- ch-
chuckling
sssssssssss shhh

Excuse me?
I
We
We
Hello? Hello-ho?
Anybody home?

If I can coincide
overlap - lap with the leaves
along the long long road
going nowhere

winding
angular routes
left left right
left
around my house
or what I call home
faster run faster

ch-ch-chuckling

can I leave?
left left
the idea of this body
this home and
rustle rustle rustling
along the water
too slow for cardio
the body does not see

behind
ahead
belong
aware
beware
forlorn
forget
routes
and strategies

str- str
uctures
str-
uctures
ruptures

maladies
str - str-
memories
str-str-
straight ahead

leave
leaves
left
left

ch - ch - chuckling
ch - ch - chuckling

and if I am part of the bricks of this city
my round mothers
and round mother’s mothers
mothered
are all of my mothers not mouthing
in the stones of the
narrow streets

I crossed my mothers street
blindly trusting so wildly
in a bright future
I did not even have
to visualise it -

mouthing mothers
screaming screeching
tyres and tongues
where were my mothers

the silence was baffling
as a car came to a stop
over my head
the smell of rubber and petrol
I have come to associate
with old beginnings and new ends

you could have been dead
mouthed the mouth of the mothers
yes
I said
yes and relished
a new word
I could attach to me

I wound it around my body
in hundreds of ribbons and
I swirled in the word
like a turning maypole:

dead
dead
dead

I don’t think

so

I

I don’t