Saturday, August 18, 2018

Names Of The Living Dead

Names Of The Living Dead
© Surazeus
2018 07 18

The old man lying under the highway bridge
listens to hum of tires on cement road
that sings with rhythm of human desire,
wondering about the people driving cars,
their names, events of their lives, and the dreams
that motivate them to exit their home
and drive their car on the highway somewhere
to perform role important to their hopes.

Taking needle of love that pokes his heart,
he stitches their names in fabric of night
to weave tapestry that shows human souls
interacting with each other in drama
that plays across crowded wall of his heart,
depicting every community of people
that ever thrived on shores of flowing streams
where children play while their parents tend gardens.

Raindrops fall from the vast void of the sky,
splattering on his face under the high bridge,
and in each droplet he can see the face
of every soul he met on road of life
since he began to walk across the land
when he was thirteen, fifty years ago,
leaving some small town in the countryside
that vanished long ago in misty haze.

The name of that small town where he was born
and raised was painted clear on every sign
announcing every town where he passed through
because the name of every country town
from sea to shining sea is the one name,
all blended together on that strange name
that no one can remember when he leaves
along with the names of people he met.

Though he remembers every distinct face,
shape, arrangement, skin, hair, and gazing eyes,
yet all their names blend into one strange name,
so he separates them out like wet pages
of the phone directory soaked in rain
and speaks aloud evey name he can read,
then whispers tale of their life in the wind
which blows past the lone windows of their homes.

How lonely they must be, the old man grins,
all those faceless people who lost their names
because he takes them when he passes by,
stealing their names with his long curling tongue
by speaking twined algorithm of hope
locked away safe in the sound of each name,
and stripping mask of their name from their face,
which leaves them exposed to rays of the void.

The universe of space is mostly void,
with stars scattered like sand on the sea shore
where planets, so small and frail in abyss
of boundless infinity, teem with life
of conscious creatures crawling from wild waves
who swing from trees to eat delicious fruit
then build cars and planes to speed across space,
zooming around our planet to find truth.

He listens to song of the ocean stone
that vibrates with desire to spark with light,
so rain cracks stone, and wind grinds stone to soil,
then seed sprouts roots that transform soil to fruit,
which the human eats so stone becomes human,
awakening with consciousness of hope
in sparkling neurons of their glowing brain,

Dipping raven feather in blood of his wrist,
the old man writes their names on cement pillar
that supports the highway of speeding cars
till every inch is red with blood of names,
and pulses with soul of humanity
who dance together in far distant towns,
singing with First Mother of the Star Sea.

Gazing at the moon that glows gold with warmth,
the old man sings names of the living dead,
and the black van speeding by in dark rain
slows down as someone shoots their gun at gloom,
and a bullet hits the old man in the head,
so he falls dead under the highway bridge,
and raindrops falling from the sparkly void
erase all our names from dream of his eyes.

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