Dead Letters
Upward drifts the twisted cursive,
Lighter than air, free from gravity,
Yet bidden by wind and dissipation.
The cigarette in the hand of a somber man
Tells and spells a tale he cannot read.
He tries to find a kind of meaning,
Fluttering upward, drawn by drafts…
It’s Greek to him—he shakes the whim;
“Why look to smoke when life writes clearer?
When printed letters tell me better?
If I, too, were free from gravity,
I could read the writing in its flight.
I’m stuck to the muck of Earth’s great girth,
Goddamn this land which holds me fast.”
With a flick, a stomp, a twist and sigh,
He returns to work without a thought.
The messenger’s killed, left unfulfilled,
The angel’s slain, but still remains
A little drifting whisper, his unheard herald—
Know that not all fallen angels lie:
“Who knows, but that in jealous flight
You hate the ground that holds you up?”
