From a Makeshift Bed

Bon soir mes amis.

This is a poem I was reminded of today. Check out more

poems here.

From a Makeshift Bed (by Joe Nolan)

The Ghost haunts my Autumn mind

on the morning after

All Hallows’ Eve.

New-born thoughts

marked

with the symbols of their own demise.

A graveyard in the groin.

A murder on the lips.

This morning, this dawn, upon waking,

I muttered a muddled

prayer

and rose from a makeshift bed

in a strange room.

I cast my fortunes

with the Dark Horse Contender.

I cast my nets in black

waters

and pull my treasure

from the pleasure

that throbs beneath

love-sore skin.

And The Eyes shine through

the 11 hundred light

like a shadow on fire.

I desire my love to come to me

feet-first.

I desire her to fall from the sky.

I will call her manna

and I will speak her name

with a great gnashing

of teeth.

I will name her Hannah

and I will meet her over

waffles and syrup

at a pick-up hitch-up

East of Eden,

West of Spokane,

where the name of the night

is blown

on Pacific winds,

through high blue

trees, that bend

with the ease of death,

taking its toll for a last breath

(a pound of flesh

when a pound of faith is lacking).

And the razing wraith of sunset

overcomes the sky

with the inevitability

of its own

falling blade.

“If we’d stayed here, things would’ve been different.”

“If we’d stayed, we’d’ve reaped The Avalanche.”

And The Hands

shape the shape

of the awkward

afternoon

(a blunt object to bludgeon

the hour by)

as the hours pass by this witness to

their mean meander.

And on the desert floor,

a salamander

swallows a mantis.

And a shark sinks

to the bottom

of some merciless

Atlantis.

And here I still an hour,

for a moment

to devour my love,

coming up through the ice.