Narrow Escape, Pt. I
The first flashes.
Eucalyptus.
In the high branches
silver splashes of moonlight
set the leaves to shimmer.
A wind arrives through the Para grass,
and crashes in the canopy
like the roar of Pacific breakers,
and washes over her
the smell of Saltcedar
and Rabbitbrush and Greasewood
that grow in the playa.
Through the blue moonshadow of the house
a fox slips without sound.
The wind squalls up again,
ruffling through the Chokecherry
beyond the high arch of the barn.
Her horse treads nervously,
eyes wide as 8 balls.
She kisses his neck
and whispers to him.
She waits.
In a distant field, a cow lows,
and across the dry dirt road
paper curls of bark roll,
Shift sideways.
The pain is nauseating.
Her muscles spasm for it,
her jaw aches
from the clench of teeth.
In her wilderness
and in the fury of the dark
she punches out,
finds the steel bed rail,
clean skins the knuckles,
feels the blood run.
Feels nothing.
Rain drips pat, pat, pat
from the roof beam.
The crude suture oozes pus.
The smell of her own wounds
is sickening, but worse now
is the recollection.
Behind the pink film of her darkness
images appear, jagged,
bubble up like ghouls from beyond.
A potassium flare in the Acacias,
the flutter of hair,
his hair, her blood
spatters in the wind like fountain spray,
fills her boots
spills in the dust, black as oil.
She can hear him crying
as if inside her,
as he was once before,
hot, heavy, unreachable.
Now in the graying dawn a whippoorwill calls.
Ok, so I kind of cheated on this assignment. I know we agreed a word limit and everything, but I just couldn't help myself. So sue me. Actually don't- I have literally no money. Thing is, although this particular post is just under 50 lines, it's only part one of a larger piece. I am terribly sorry. So if you'd like to send me a death threat, I completely understand, but could you please leave it in the comments box below? I'm just thinking about the paper wastage.Thank you kindly.
Ok, so I kind of cheated on this assignment. I know we agreed a word limit and everything, but I just couldn't help myself. So sue me. Actually don't- I have literally no money. Thing is, although this particular post is just under 50 lines, it's only part one of a larger piece. I am terribly sorry. So if you'd like to send me a death threat, I completely understand, but could you please leave it in the comments box below? I'm just thinking about the paper wastage.Thank you kindly.
die.
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