Empty Box Of Dreams

Empty Box Of Dreams
© Surazeus
2024 10 27

The empty box by the side of the road, 
that once contained possessions of my soul, 
bounces and flaps with gusts of brutal wind, 
buffeted by cars zooming somewhere else, 
and spills its nothingness across the grass 
which transforms into nameless ghost of hope. 

The empty box of dreams, I left behind 
when I gave all my possessions away, 
waits among weeds on pebbles that have gleamed 
in dust four billion years since Earth cooled down 
from molten state to conjure human souls 
who search for treasure in cave of illusions. 

The empty box of secrets, that fell off 
the passing pickup truck when its tire bounced 
over wind-smoothed stone of salvation, floats 
in sudden whoosh of wind into the air, 
almost with passion to transcend sad fate 
of keeping something safe I want to hide. 

The empty box tumbling over the field 
cries out with voice of soft indifferent wind 
to the cactus, that does the yoga pose 
named Standing Wind Release, for directions 
to the safe house where I have fled to hide 
from the man who shoots his gun at my heart. 

The empty box by the side of the road 
has lost my favorite red dress and shoes 
I wore on our first date to the playhouse 
where we watched my sister, gowned as an angel, 
lead pioneers to steal land from the natives, 
which hangs tattered now on a barbed-wire fence. 

The empty box with label on its side 
printed with address of the house we bought 
when I was pregnant with our little girl 
who cried when he beat her head with his fist, 
scatters her baby clothes across the field 
where he buried her to escape the law. 

The empty box, half open by the sign 
painted red as the blood that soaks my dress, 
preserves existential angst of true love, 
symbolized as red bullet of desire 
he shoots into my heart with bitter tears 
as he shouts I belong only to him. 

The empty box, that holds my broken heart 
in fragile hands of helpless sorrow, cries 
with anguish as my hand clutches its flap, 
torn as wing of the fallen angel, shock 
pulsing fierce as ocean waves when I laugh 
at calm irony of vanishing light.