libation

The flock of clouds witnessed him from above

manifesting destiny with a shovel, a glove,

a bag of seed, barrels, grapes, a trelis of rope,

yet it was not in his blood to bear the hope

nor pain of this rugged coast.

He was born beneath another banner’s song, beside

another sea, and contentment can be pried

even from the rugged hands of a happy man

whose breath and back still tend a land

his heart has not been called.

And so he rode a train of metal boxes east

along a metal scar, wheels grinding on the piece

of mind that churns still faster than the gears

and turns the soiled decade into a sapling year

of hard and unplowed births.

Hard as concrete screaming by for miles outside

the city gates, vacant lots, a thousand vacant eyes

attached to empty hands still full of strength,   

and through his pane, he plots a garden’s length

beneath the howl of gray.

A year has come and past and parking lots remain

yet lawns are sprouting squash and cabbages and grain.

A strong and pretty girl kneels beside him planting seeds;

they have a secret chicken that they hide from the police,

and he is learning how to laugh.

The flock of city clouds whisper from above,

“All of us are migrants looking for a land to love;

we are but a vapor, a momentary mist

growing gray and heavy until the blessed bliss

of giving ourselves away.”