©2021 Michael Raven

wearied walking mounds
memories buried masks
dig through the dust
of ancestors or self
                              maybe madness
i am certain --
it is me searching me in
this corrupted clay

i poured myself
into nighttime bleeding
the universe feeding
on the flesh and soul
of my being
severed to fused and
cauterize with an
obsidian blade while
birds were shrieking

we gave our everything
               was everything enough?

slag and shamble back to bed
to sleepless dusk to dawn
too enervated to rise to more
than simple words
when i find you

how do i atone?