Beyond
the well, along the dusty road,
America
first,
the
acrid, rust-red soil supporting
only an
occasional small vineyard, they strolled
house to
house, executing families.
We heard
a great noise and were all enveloped
in a wall
of heat and steam, as concrete
balconies
crashed into parked cars, an officer
lowered a
plastic bag over her head while
another
ground a lit cigarette into her arm,
America
first.
The
melting snow, semi-translucent
and
shining in the lantern glow,
seemed to
be carved out of a block of amber.
We worked
our way back, following
a little
creek, sucking on
twigs of
sassafras and radiant sunshine
until,
fringed by majestic pines,
we
reached the canyon edge
and lit
the sacred fire.
Although
the time scale was so vast and
the abuse
of evidence so complete as to render
it
unlikely, the flutes and rattles summoned
a
universal healing.
It was
the moment of return,
the
ancient languages, long declared extinct
by the
experts, springing suddenly back to life,
America
first.
All we
had were elders, drums, spirits,
and what
they told us.
John Curl
American
Eagle
American
eagle soars above
the
crater of the old volcano,
abandoned
prayers
nebulous
hypocrisy clouds
morning
dew apologies privatizing
water, sailors
in makeup, apparently
on orders
from the city
manager,
ransacked the branch
library
and an adjoining nursery
school,
crashed burning taxis into
stores,
car alarms blaring for hours set
off by
the blast. Investigators are
trying to
reconstruct
the chain
of events.
The
remarkable irony, especially
in view
of their bizarre reproductive
habits,
is that they are no longer even
curious
about it.
At the
bottom of a
sunken
road with high sandy
banks
tunneled by earthworms,
minor
prophets wave burned-out candles,
rusted
egrets and weather cocks
tranquilly
balance racoons chewing
hibiscus
buds, hopeful erotic swans
healing
harmonies scattered
one by
one like cattails
over the
vast expanse of ground.
American
eagle soars above
the
crater of the old volcano, gazing into
the
caldera and dreams
of restoring the waters.
John Curl
Copyright © 2012 by John Curl. All rights reserved.