Hey, can you give me a sign?

I’m blind, so let me touch your murmuring lips,

While you preach transformation and dharma,

How suffering is alchemy

And change is the only guarantee.

 

Tell me how the brave belie temperance, detachment,

Indifferent to sideline cheerleaders, hope

Harvesters on megaphones blaring left,

Right, anywhere but straight through, and truth,

A man-made obstacle in a rearview mirror.

 

But I terror-sleep since the tank, strafed

By grimaces that swallow faces whole,

Beasts in uniforms tossing brown paper

Lunch sacks into a dark hole, its dank air

Like a fireless dragon’s last gasp, a hoarse whisper.

 

I reach for you, there in me, a space to blossom;

you, wizened ravage on shakier legs, and yet,

A stalwart heart, gilded by smoke and simmer,

Emerged from dingy light, a door exploding closed,

Booming me, an inverse perp walk bathed in moonbeam.