High Walls

Butterflies convulse on the breeze, 

embers of charred snow falling

from blazing wooden rooftops and,

below, sunlight drifts on a slow tide,

reflecting off handfuls of broken glass onto the street,

casting crooked white angels

onto high walls. As if we had souls to spare.

Dawn is a depth-charge,

the opening of a casket to the flight

of clustering dreams of red velvet

interiors.

Another new sky that falls within our reach.

Hold it, feel the yielding grain,

and it is gone with a shiver through the floors,

the loop of fear that slips onto your body

without a single touch. Locked inside fear,

the pace of pounding bedded in

between sheafs of silences.

Eyes held by invisibility, mirror images of their erasure.

They are jewels prised out of broken faces,

their forgotten stories strung like pearls

on blind wraiths, wreaths ground to pieces.