Questioning Saturday

Near Courtland

—Photo by Robert Lee Haycock

 COMMUTED SENTENCE
—Robert Lee Haycock, Antioch

Rolling backward through the night
Freighted with the fro-ing and to-ing of today
Perpetuities of furrowed brow
Befuddled by empty piano benches

Folded into paper planes and bent into boats
Rising and falling
They fly
They drown

Sharps and flats
Rests and ritardandos
Music unread
Music unheard

Except in hallucinations
Of houses on hollowed hills

 And I Beheld When He Had Opened the Sixth Seal

—Photo by Robert Lee Haycock

 YOU ARE AS AM I
—Robert Lee Haycock

You
Are questioning Saturday
As am I

You
Are piling stones against the sea
As am I

You
Are watching a film without subtitles
As am I

You
Are dirtying another's hands
As am I

You
Are learning a new word
As am I

You
Are searching after the next earthquake
As am I

You
Are seeing an old love in the face of a dog
As am I

You
Are watching someone die
As am I

 Near Courtland

—Photo by Robert Lee Haycock

 DISEMBODIED
—Robert Lee Haycock

Those eyes open all at once
Staring and blind
Dolls' heads
Wondering where their bodies have gone
Wanting to be held
Just wanting to be held
 

4 Jan. 2015 Sunrise

—Photo by Taylor Graham

 SNOWLINE

—Taylor Graham, Placerville

The kitchen was freezing
after its old owners moved away, taking
their cat who left dead mice before the stove.
The whole room held its breath
against its walls.
Nothing so cold as an abandoned kitchen.
Then two musicians
moved in. They painted the walls forest-
green, red dirt, and sunflower yellow
with trills of a guitar.
The woman carried in crates of tomatoes
and squash from her garden,
kept an iron kettle steaming for tea. She grew
plump as a garden fruit, and harvested
a son who runs through the kitchen
this winter morning, calling
wash-your-mouth-out words that flash
like sun through a spotless
kitchen window, Shut Up and
Sing!

_______________________

Today's LittleNip:

THERE IS THAT MOON
—Robert Lee Haycock

There is that moon again
Trying to crawl in through this window
But for the shadow of a tree on the curtain
My bedroom would be too too full of dreams

_______________________

—Medusa

Downtown

—Photo by Robert Lee Haycock