Sun speckles drip deep in graveyard crack

Trancelike pings bounce between concrete, pounds

Tinkling ore falls slip! From fingers open

Too open, working furiously

Across slickened face

Origins of tongue-foamed 

Plans ram furiously up

Against the backside of 

Hopings bored deep

Worry thick, glazed-over

Quick “hey I’ll see you,

I think, lets”

Torturous cornered ponderance,

Simmered into sweetness, marinated 

And lasso’d, the marionette

Wraps round tight, walks tall

Searing muscle memory

Into stone

Toeing gently the gutter slats,

Sideways acid washes scents

In rivers from our blind spot

A redolent bouquet

Of urban aroma

Rushes past,

Blink-and-you’ll-miss-it

And doe-eyed, the leathered man on the corner

Hopes we’ll listen 

But we move too quickly to hear

We pull our hands back,

Afeared of touching something strange

Worried it will seep allover

And wrest us from comfort

Coating our tongues with iron,

We bite eversmall pieces 

Of the places we visit, gouging 

Fingered cores in untouched corners

Spit them out

Take a picture

And stomp them between 

The slats of the metal grate

Leaving the branch we bit

To wither

It’ll grow less flowers next year

And we’ll forget

it was ever made to propagate 

In the first place.