The Journey Toward

The city is a grandmother: love, impropriety and aromas,

Stars dripping from the fringes of insomniac nights,

And the vertigo of unfurling stories,

that invariably lead towards her deepest chambers

where the dead awaits,

like the drifting shadows of poetry

Embalmed in the impotence of chartered silence

that is ritually sliced, in a giggle,

a smooch, and shared chocolate bars.

Rows of children in uniforms, pencils and notebooks,

Uncomprehending gazes at exquisite death and exotic verse,

The impatience of life flickering in their eyes.

The occasional benevolence of wintered sign boards

that guard six foot indulgence and cold marbled love

from being spurned into a virtual space-

that ruthlessly tags, and consequently forgets,

The poet, The murderer, The king, The victim,

And the tombs that own them.

Someday, before my undocumented self flutters,

A whiff in the air and a wafer of memory.

There is the dream of a journey,

Towards a lost city,

In the most intimate stories of which

Sleeps, my beloved poet in his tomb.