Awakening from the dream of war

Awakening from the dream of war
in a moonlit field in a northern state,
flood of blue now overflowing.

The silver resolves from the shimmer
of a pale child hugging the blur of a goat
in the sweeping curve of the moon.

Her ocean hair falls across my face
leaves my mouth full of bone and ash,
a thin smile spreading into a wound.

Standing in the clearing still,
stumps remarking the hourly ring,
the gnomon impatient at the leash.

The American Mythos

copperhead and water moccasin
and the long bamboo hook
with the loop to catch them
contain fang and venom in a barrel
filled with scorpion and spider
such were the objects of our desire

the scorpion stings the spider
the snake eats the scorpion
I laugh even though
I do not think it was ever funny
then some little kid kicks the can
over suddenly and the world
is screaming and on fire

everyone running to the river
not forgetting no Lethe no Leman
no sticks or stones skipping
over the black mercurial flow
of our summer god that summer
the Trinity River
our own fertile tributary of the Ganges
reading our names written
long ago in sandy riverbed
composed of ashes of the dead

the alligator gar comes crossing
the seam spreading behind prehistoric eyes
moving like music rising up in morning fog
hung over the water like a faceless shroud
of the man who refused to die turned upside down

lamb's blood threads whirlpools
beyond the gate of horn
there we were so perfectly young
and knocking knocking and waiting
not knowing waiting for it to be opened
pounding upon the rock fearing not
beating upon my chest like Tarzan
and all my companions
silent in the canoe

Old Man Johnson
crazy legged cannibal
lived in the yellow house up the river
under beards of moss and spider web
wasp nested bug infested
an abandoned place
the lost temple of the Trinity
broken dusted windows
watching me climbing
upon the rotting stairs
on a board creaking dare
the others fixed in the canoe
in the electric midnight air

seeing those strange deflated balloons
slithering slow around the room
grey white maggots odor of ozone in an ooze
ammonia and the wet chasm chthonic water womb
mysteries in whispered fables told with no morals
in the licking light of last night's campfire
under a prurient moon

up there in the vacant living room I descended
avoiding brown syringes rusted blood bent broken
gradations of furious desire and dark brown bottles
cooing like owls in the tarnished boughs
as a fur white cocoons crack open
underneath my standing releasing spilling
light blue crystalline vaporine tendrils that tenderly
performed strange alchemy upon the soft pink neural caves
of my innocent virgin brain
the gar awakening in black water from a dream
a long snake moans uncoiling from my spine
as I am finally before the door again
knocking

thinking not hoping
that no one will really answer
as if I am praying to the dead god
knocking
then the heavy footsteps
from the other side
Old Man Johnson thump and slide
one leg missing broken stride
heavy thundering hammering
coming from the other side
here's your prayer's answering
he coming to get me
fear igniting stumbling falling

then the icy kiss of the needle
this medical metallic penetration
injecting rusty burning under the skin
the violent rattle of the door
the thundering of the floor
up and stumbling tripping
collapsing in the bottom of the canoe

go go go and my tribe pounding
the ancient waters of the Trinity
like those others from so long ago
questions questions then the silent staring
at the needle hanging wasp bent
into my hand I see it now again
and I begin again to understand

tumbling down that Trinity
with epiphanic explosions
celebrating headless prophets
wandering the concrete rivers
in Augustine's Lost City of God
preaching poetry to the whores
in wild mad howling cries
Babylonian babblings sung
as we cut through the water
under empty skies

ageless paddling into gargoyle mocking winds
before me I see the bone white barge
floating in the flesh and furnace of the Congo
a thousand cannibals danced in files
the skull faced lean witch doctors
mumbo jumbo mumbo jumbo
what do I remember of that skeletal tale
squalor and sad trumpet elephantine ivory
barges drifting overloaded with bones
oozing luminescent slime from the moon
crocodiles chasing little black sambo
grows a tail turns into a tadpole
shakes down in the mud
like a topless dancer
primordial sludge
I am now forever
buried in the deep down darkness
of things

crucified women
sing from crosses
lining the banks
there hung she
distant dreamer of days
in an all-american trance
suffering sarcastically
with twilight truth
unrequited love
and this misspent youth

falling faintly faintly calling the archangel
furious over missed annunciations
priest torn vestments that no longer cover
obscene statues of pagan masturbations
pounding pounding pounding
upon the dead god's drum
until I saw her

yes
she floated
in a pretense of magnificent mammalian abandon
licking her pink nails with a serpent's tongue
my life now lost in her endless life line lying
in her palm tree oasis as she slipped up soft inside of me
and caressed my spine
yes she asked
as if I was now compelled and under oath
and yes I replied

the boys still dive into the Trinity
from sun splattered cliffs
arcing super heroes
into quietly desperate destinies
as the alligator gar glides
beneath them hungrily
Crazy Leg Johnson is still coming to get me
we are all of us bound together at the bone
perhaps these are all too much with me
too much and never enough
because my wound is always aching
this dark spinal scar
upon the American Mythos
forged in those interior fires
of the long lost summer fables

we had no idea we spoke as oracles
hoping for dead god's voices
to wake us before we drowned

Tat Tvam Asi

For Ashley Berger


An old photograph of my self
Wearing a younger face,
A face I no longer recognize.

Who is that stranger
There beneath the skin
Staring out from in my eyes?

The self inside looks for sign
Of who it once was when
It was smiling in that face.

This is a slippery fish
To think about: my self now
Standing in an other self's place.

Where is the self that once was I?
When was it born? And did it die?
My minds are now both filled with doubt.

You are staring at me inside the mirror,
Is it me now looking in? Am I you or
Am I the one now looking out?

She opened the door of night

She opened the door of night
And became unhinged.
Hanging upon a turning knob,
Lifting high as her children's kite
Had lifted love and then was lost.

Wheels sing with the sky,
Constellations not composed of stars
But of a billion hollowed moments.
Every thought as unconnnected
As a heart's diagram exploded.

Walking in a spiraled ring
On suspended sands in Alabama,
Her faith the duration of a flower.
In the drystone riverbeds of Babylon,
She unsieves sediments of the hour.

She made her bed at last inside
The shadows blanket thinking:
There'll be time enough tomorrow.
As the lunatic moon undid
Her countenance of sorrow.

The Mourning Rituals

The morning rituals:
Water set to boil,
The coffee measured out in spoonfuls,
Paper filters folded in half -
Because we ran out of the right ones.
It satisfies me to improvise,
To make do with less;
I wonder if there's less than this,
Less than this, I whisper
Quietly to myself.

Cat is out back
Lounging in a square of sunlight.
I open the window and meow,
Startling cat awake -
Go out to fill its bowl
As cat meows and hisses at me.
No one ever taught you how
To show proper gratitude,
I say to myself.
Then meow and hiss back

The water is boiling.
I remove it from the base
Letting it cool down some
So as not to make the coffee bitter.
Then pour it over the cone,
Adjusting my flow in
To equal the flow out.
A perfect slurry,
I say out loud to no one
And then I also add a meow.

I stir in a spoonful of sugar,
Then a spoonful of cream,
Watching the Milky Way
Spin in endless night,
Endlessly fascinated.
Never tiring of this part of my life,
Marveling like a child
At the simple daily events.
I am a child,
I think out loud.

It pleases me to bang
My spoon rhythmically around
The mug's interior listening
For the distant bell from the Monastery
And the ancient bell of the ox.
Then I hear her say, Jesus!
From the other room.
You're gonna miss this ringing
One day after I'm gone,
I say out loud.

This world is no longer home for me

This world is no longer home for me:
There's a fishing boat up in a tree,
The inverted cross of its anchor hangs
Loose as the tongue of a bell exhausted.

The neighbor's house cut in half
Exposing the unmade bed and blue sheet,
An easy chair facing a shattered TV,
A black boot standing on the stair.

The Laughing Horse gutted clean:
What remains behind is empty frame.
And once surrounded by a home,
A solitary door half opening.

Down on Tarpon street,
Beside the piles of blank debris,
The boatless fisherman drink for free:
Siren's tears from broken glass.

A hermit crab from a souvenir shop
Tumbles in a tide now amniotic,
His new home the empty shell
Of a washed up piece of plastic.

Born of Sun

Born of Sun,
Out flesh of woman,
He stands,
Sword hanging his hand
Like a curse.

Sea incarnadine,
Attacked abject rage,
Blood surf,
Wounds opening words
Between waves.

The son set
Himself against father.
Eternity paused,
Blood letting loose lost
Amidst slaughter.

Ever mutable
Memory of death,
Full fathoms mine,
Words echoing lie
Under last breaths.

Born on waves
Icarus descended,
She rides,
Pulsing tides
In vulnerable ended.

As Albert Ayler Stood

To live for the love of God.
To stand as a reflection from God.

As Albert Ayler stood
When the music moved
Through him.
As Chang Tzu's butcher slipped
His blade effortlessly inside
The spaces in between
The bones of breath.
Dancing with the ox,
Raised up on hind legs,
To Summertime.

Summetime...
In the easy evening light
Upon the killing floor
Until the sweet beast shuddered,
Let go a low moan
Sounding sigh
Unwinding
Its last breath.
As if it grasped
Its own sweet death,
Falling apart,
Being entirely separated,
A harmonic graced note
Suspended, then faded
Into blood and bone and flesh
And air.

Could George Gershwin
Have ever imagined Albert Ayler?

On Easter Sunday
In Eliot's crowded Cathedral,
The Sisters of Maculate Mercy,
Stand before the congregation,
Black veils breathing
Over faces ruined by elation,
Singing,
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

In our less than critical evasions,
We think of the voice of the Rilkean angel,
A terrible beauty uncontainable,
Reverberating in a cul de sac,
Trapped in the apse
Of this terminal musical cathedral,
Notes now not so much as fading
As collapsing inward
Under the pressure of inadequacy
Into the absolute silence of the crypt.

There is the haunting question:
When is even music inadequate
To the task of surrounding
Human experience with meaning?

Here at John Coltrane's funeral,
Thought rings with the unimaginable:
The human being is not inevitable.
Ayler's accidental notes inscribing
The sigil of our unwelcome presence
Upon the pain turned threshold
Where being itself becomes unbearable.

The punch-line always ready to pounce.
And the Pretty and Sweet and Lovely
Are now the over-painted terrors,
The wandering ghostly errors,
Singing Fuck Fuck Fuck on Easter Sunday,
Profanity now a prayer.

There is meaning.
There is meaning.
But it is a music we can barely endure,
A music we can hardly hear,
The bone's prayer -
God's ghost shuddering
Through Albert Ayler.


***

Sources and antecedent:
http://www.laughingbone.com/thelaughingbone/word/prose/a-beautiful-lie-but-beautiful-nonetheless

The Gemini

For my sister. 



When I was a child,
My mother would take
My sister and I
Out in a boat,
Where we would float
Across the sky.

Those technicolor blue
Texas evenings,
Listening to cicadas sigh
In pulsing waves,
Shivering the world
Star bright.

She took us to the Gemini,
Lit green coils for the night,
Twining us in smoke
As we lay upon a blanket
Waiting for the light.

That distant music
From across the lake,
A sunken song of revery.
And my father's voice -
The man with no name
Speaking straight to me.

Going home
She'd hide us in the trunk
With her wedding dress and tailored history.
She'd never forget us -
She said - forging
Our sorrow in that tragedy.

We could hear her
Wondering where we were,
Calling our names as she jangled her keys.
Laughter gave us away -
She was always surprised to find us still there,
Adamant in her memory.

You once thought death would save you

You once thought death would save you
As a thousand prayers reconcile into one
And the rattling breaths of the old man
Shake in the bed of the child unborn.

Her dresses stand still in the closet
And her presence hangs still in perfume.
The dog's bed is unmade in the corner
And the cat will not enter the room.

Come walk with me down to the garden
Where she watered the bones of our love,
Where the silence of her unsaying
Was traced in the dead leaves' dust.

Her hair is like the moss in the river,
A red ribbon in the red robin's nest.
Where is the life you have lost in the living?
Where is the love you have lost in her death?

The Lighter

I’m reading the words of a dead writer,
Soft her voice sings new in my head.
Between the pages I find a lighter
To show the pathway to the dead.

How comes the light from this device?
She just hands me a piece of gold
For passage through this world of lies,
To warm my mind when it is cold.

With this, I wander through worlds of night,
Over mountain peak and ocean wave,
I’m lost and found in desert’s bright
And time for got is not for gave.

And the writer’s device to light the dead
Was stolen by her whose words I read.


See: https://dreamsofawakingman.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-odd-tool-to-operate-on-dead.html

Under a darkening sun

the miller makes a promise
his daughter in the balance
paper under stone as the great wheel
thunders round again
crushing seed down into dust

lilly pads and lotus
great watery fields of green
with blood laced white petals unfolding
under the immaculate unconcern of the sun

she dreams on the edge between
half above half submerged half remembering
orbs of eyes radiant with indolent avarice
in the large mouthed features of the fish
figuring eights beneath the drawn down faces
of the choiring frogs leaping
in lazy coils from pad to pad
the adversary waiting just beneath

the mill pond contains her history
the spring babelling out from under fallen leaves
she sits interpreting whispered prophecy
about the mounding and the making of the dam
the fool's desire to arrest the riverring
to capture and contain the night sky's twire
in the stillness of the world's darkening
bones planted high up there
as in the deep down of things
seeds of future reckoning informing
the pulsing chirp of cricket’s wings
as the day and night are evening

the water wheel turns
the waterfall is falling
and as stone rolls over stone
she overhears again the oath
spoken all too easily
with too many words
each new one further
diminishing
the vow he made to her

now the adversary stands before the door
the miller holding her bright spun hair
as if this golden offering could buy more
time but the adversary smiling says there
is no more time as the great wheel ceases
its constant rolling turning
to thundering quiet

her soft hair comes undone
under a violent hand



See: https://dreamsofawakingman.blogspot.com/2018/04/under-darkening-sun.html

The Tiger's Tail

I

How with this brokenness is the dream sustained?
How does this story go?
These memories that with I alone remain,
Tired out, sleepless, old.

Sheer plodding along through plowed down verse,
Soiled, abused and overtold,
Meat falls from my bones with a curse
Only seeming, never shown.


II

I found my way into the Tiger’s den
As he was dreaming of the Rose,
Clasped my fingers around his tail,
A symmetry in repose.

And what could I do but transcribe old themes?
God’s starbright skull still full of seeds,
The flesh, the bone, the Tiger’s Dreams,
The cut, the cry, and the wound that bleeds.

And the Fool that stole the bone,
And the shell that cracked the sea,
In this abysmal dark I am not alone
The dreaming god is here with me.


III


The tail twitches in my hand,
The rough beast come round at last
To face me where I stand
Tied securely to this mast.

I’ll not let go again
As I have done so many times before.
I’ve honed my mind with discipline
To endure the Tiger’s roar.

His Master's Voice

Outside it heralds April

the secret grill of agency

the back patio of St Antonio

lost legacies of absent fathers

mesquite thorn coal fire 

glowing in the west

right back there at Inwood

St Augustine dreams

right back there in the woods

down by the creek

turning over wet stone

searching for god's sign

what was once written
underneath

alphabets of mosses

her bright fallen hair

hieroglyphic minnows 

silver slivers shining starlight

and he is there

right where he always was

waiting for me to find him

not trying to hide

that face at the limit
of the fire's light

skull like shadows

watching over me

dark guardian

minnow flash of this
in my memory

all brought on by
the burning mesquite

We stay there in the kitchen

windows open
sprung evening air

half drunk 

sitting on the counters
under stove light

listening to Joe Nick's records

on the portable player
some R&B collection

and Barbara Lewis

this perfect voice

parting the melancholy curtain of

shoo-bop

shoo-bop

my baby

Hello Stranger

it seems so good to see you back again

a distant voice calling me back

to Inwood

to Gunstream

to an ancient face

from the fire

I know I've heard the song before

perhaps the first time with my mother

watching her listen

and seeing her gaze turn inwards

sinking into sorrow

of a lost husband

It seems like a mighty long time

mighty long time

and those shoo-bops

like crickets in the night

under a honeyed moon 

on a beach

in Galveston

But I've never listened to the song before

here in San Antonio

sunk under weighted waves

rising out of distant
long passed disasters
those selfsame waves
in sequent toil
once erasing the shore
now carving into it

listening to this surf's song alone

sung words spinning

I am right back there 

and he is right back here

never having gone

a pattern unmoving but alive

so still it seemed part of the water

so quiet it seemed part of the silence

And Barbara Lewis 

sings his words

to me
he is speaking
to me
through music
under this pressure
of the present presence 

memory breaks

down into

shoo-bop

shoo-bop
my baby
mantra prayer invocation

incarnating
what seemed a ghost
what seemed lost memory

I know he never left
I know he never died

I know now it was me
always me

I was the one
who unremembered
buried the unconcealing
under covering

I am
my absent father

my lost son
my dead friend

my dream forgot
my love left alone

and I am listening
to this song
this fragile net of notes
words written on the water

over and over

I am
the drowning man
descending
forgetting
overburdened
with the weight
of my own deceiving

I am
letting go
opening the hand
that instinctually held on
letting go the coward's knife
easiest thing in the world

eyes cut opening like stars

because I can again hear

being sung by Barbara Lewis

bell clear being
ringing through
the pasteboard mask
of this world
seeing
his hand on the rope
hearing
the bell resounding
membrane through marrow
engraving
and I am dawned upon
believing

As you know
you know
you remember
that dog's doggy brain burning
transfixed
with an incomprehensible
yearning
waging tail
wagging wagging
before the Victrola's trumpet
on the player's table turning
forever listening
as his master's voice
is being
unsealing

Shoo-bop shoo-bop
my baby
shoo-bop shoo-bop
my baby
it seems like a mighty long time

***

Hello, stranger
(ooh) It seems so good to see you back again
How long has it been?
(ooh, seems like a mighty long time)
(shoo-bop, shoo-bop, my baby, ooh)
It seems like a mighty long time

Oh-uh-oh, I my, my, my, my
I'm so glad
You stopped by to say "hello" to me
Remember that's the way it used to be
Ooh, it seems like a mighty long time
(shoo-bop, shoo-bop, my baby, ooh)

Oh-uh-oh
I'm so glad you're here again

Oh-uh-oh
Shoo-bop, shoo-bop, my baby
Shoo-bop, shoo-bop, my baby

Oh-ahh-uh-oh
If you're not gonna stay
(ooh) Please don't treat me like you did before
Because I still love you so a-a-although
It seems like a mighty long time

Shoo-bop, shoo-bop, my baby, ooh
It seems like a mighty long time
Oh-uh-oh, I my, my, my, my
I'm so happy that you're here again
(shoo-bop, shoo-bop, my baby)

Wikipedia:

Hello Stranger" was written by Barbara Lewis herself, who was originally inspired to write a song with that title while working gigs in Detroit with her musician father: “I would make the circuit with my dad and people would yell out: ‘Hey stranger, hello stranger, it’s been a long time’". The song is notable because its title comprises the first two words of the lyrics but is never at any point repeated throughout the rest of the song. 

Lewis recorded "Hello Stranger" at Chess Studios in Chicago in January 1963. The track's producer Ollie McLaughlin recruited the Dells to provide the background vocals. The arrangement by Riley Hampton - then working with Etta James - featured a signature organ riff provided by keyboardist John Young. The track was completed after thirteen takes. Lewis would recall that, on hearing the playback of the finished track, Dells member Chuck Barksdale "kept jumping up and down and saying, ‘It’s a hit, it’s a hit.’...I didn’t really know. It was all new to me.” 

McLaughlin flew to New York City to pitch "Hello Stranger" to Atlantic Records, who had picked up Lewis' previous two singles for national release. Atlantic optioned "Hello Stranger" but then had second thoughts on the viability of releasing such an unusual track. The ascendancy of "Our Day Will Come" by Ruby & the Romantics to the top of the Pop and R&B charts in March 1963 motivated Atlantic to release "Hello Stranger" that month;[2] entering the Billboard Hot 100 in April 1963, the track took another month to reach the Top 40. Impelled by its #1 status in St. Louis, MO, it entered the Billboard Top Ten that June for a five-week stay.

And I don't give a fuck

Anatomies of sorrow.
Were there only ten reasons?
Otis Redding.
Sam Cooke.
Marvin Gaye.
Tom Waits.
Trying to find another...

Down to the Faust Tavern.
Maker's Mark on ice,
Shot of well tequila,
No salt,
No lime,
Hi Life back.
Sit at a table.

In April...
I don't know where the fuck
I will be in April.
So then I should just...
Whatever you want...
I can't think about anything
Beyond this weekend.
That's all good
I'm working to live my life
Two weeks at a time.
I'm done after I finish this Maker's.
I'm gonna have another shot.
See you back at the house.
See you.
You want anything?
No,
Just finish that fast.
You can go on...
So you're just gonna stay here
And drink?
I reckon.

There's the thunder
Of Death Metal.
Some leathered fuck
Behind me
With a nervous knee
Shaking the floor boards
Out of time.

You walking me back home?
I'm walking back.
Coming back to the bar?
I reckon not.
You reckon?
I reckon.

You know Oscar Wilde...
I can hear you sigh.
He said,
There are two tragedies in life:
Never getting
What you desire;
And the worse,
Getting
What you desire.
When you talk like that
It exhausts my brain.
I'm just trying to say
I love you.
Well it's tiring.
And I don't want to have
To try and figure out
Something like that now.

You know,
I see all these couples
In the grocery store
Walking around
And I think:
Jesus,
What chumps.
Why would you stay
With a woman man person
Like that?
And then you come along
Complaining about
The Bordeaux selection
At this yuppie fuckhole,
Or the price of havarti,
Asking why I picked up
The wrong green salsa
And I don't feel like a chump.
And that's when I know
I still love you.

Because I don't make you feel
Like a chump?

Because you do
And I don't
Give a fuck.

The only thing interesting about her was her skull.

source

Living under the constant pressure of death.

The tragedy of youth is to believe you are going to live forever
while that of old age is knowing you have run out of time.
And what time remains is saturated with a core-tiredness.
The energies contained within hope have been long depleted.

Words like empty shells,
no longer full of life,
quiet echoes of what they once were.

God,
I am sick to death
of all these dead metaphors.
The sea shell is traded
for the dried carapace of the cicada,
clinging with a dead mother's grip
to the bark of the pecan tree,
this sepia skinned remnant
smelling like insect death
Van Gogh's boots
her jacket on the hook
that still holds the shape
and perfume of her days.

What is there left to do that hasn't been done already?

The bored artist idly carves
into the face of his muse,
desecrating her beauty,
heedless of her pain,
watching the blood fill
and fall from the wounds.

Is this it?

He reloads his brush with her blood,
spreading the skin apart to dig deep,
has no idea what he might paint,
somehow the dripping brush
seems too much

The only thing interesting about her
was her skull.

Ancient Lullabye

White Woman, James Whistler
source

The rats come out of the walls at night
As bones crack in the leaves
Balancing upon the edge of sleep
Teeth gnawing at my memories

My mother dances with a door
Pirouettes a rug around the room
I say I've never heard her laugh that way
As her face unsolves in the moon

An old man trembles in the barber's chair
His face wrecked with new grief
As the razor erases all his tears
I watch minnows clean his teeth

Whiskers brush against my eyes
The globe shatters beside my bed
A woman whistles ancient lullabyes
About the memories of the dead

After a Sickness

source

I am better.
But not the same.
Diminished
From what I was before.
Perhaps this is old age.

A thousand Lilliputians,
Have secured their ropes around me,
Drawn down the flesh of my face.
Dug trenches around
The ghost of my exhausted smile.

The quicksand drag of the grave
Unties my shoelaces.
Having stumbled a few steps in,
A gravity guides my feet,
Tucked tightly in the winding sheet.

Maybe there's no more easy days,
Hope close at hand,
Now all gone beyond the pale,
What's left is the futile fight,
The dull ache of awakening.

Maybe that last glass of wine
Still full
On the nightstand the next morning
Will keep mocking my ambitions
From the night before.

Thoughts recycle this pained drama.
It's strange to feel you'll never be
Quite who you were before,
To see a stranger in the mirror
Mindlessly brushing your teeth.

As a wounded dying animal
Looks out at you accusingly,
Sinking further deep down
Into the depths
Of your eyeholes.

I imagine there's strength
In seeing your blood
Still warm in your children.
But I wouldn't burden another creature
To wear this guilty mask.

I didn't believe my mother and father
Would hang on as long as they did.
Up every morning with a sigh,
Somehow remain alive,
Asleep leaving on the light.

It happens all over again again.
It's difficult to think of doing anything else
When living is all you've known.
No one teaches us how to die.
To stop doing what we've always done.

Everyone mills around the station,
Mumbling around in a ring,
Collapsed overcoats sitting upon the benches,
Suitcases spilling threadbare undergarments
And long sleeved dress shirts.

All uncertain of their ticket status,
Compulsively wandering
Through empty pockets,
Occasionally wondering
How they ended up here.

Wasn't there something else we were once doing,
More important than this tired waiting?