Day 26 #napowrimo - day 20 #the100dayproject - Almanac

Day 26 of #napowrimo and I'm finding that my mind is going to some strange places...maybe I'm going stir-crazy....

Almanac

Flora is the closest thing to fluorescent flowers

the bread bloated, needing to be kneaded

with wheat flour. The tassels swaying in the wind,

the fauna moving in the wind. The chickadee

with the cotton tuft in its mouth like a moth

batting its wings in terror, knowing its death.

Even the beautiful birds are carnivorous

And digest the proteins of the ant and worm.

As do I, the meat of my sustenance, I gather

Around me; I will make my nest out of cotton

Batting its wings in terror. Stuff it with

Sorrow and sunshine, sew it up with my aching

Bones, the herring bone stitch made from

the ivory whites of my knuckles and knees.

The weather outside contains itself with

Its overcast shadow, an architecture

Of rain and clouds and I have always found

That mammals are the animals of milk,

Reptiles the monsters of milk, eggs

Hardened milk, fragile and soft at first,

Then they harden like the base of the skull.

I ripen into my dreams, graffiti my body

With love and conspiracy theories. I wear

My hometown like a dress made of street names,

The numbers on the sides of my houses.

And those become my numbers, too,

My securities and identities to dole out

What I believe is true of myself, the numbers

Are proof of my memories that I can look

Out any window and see myself reflected back

Like a myth written in an old book, yellowed

With sunlight and time.

I am the night story

No longer read aloud, but read silently

Like a letter to myself that I rewrite onto

A postcard to someone I do not know;

Someone who walks the boundaries and borders,

Margins and alleyways of my animal instincts,

Maybe the streetlight will unshadow

That person and of course that person will always be

myself.