SONG OF THE WITHERED LEAF

Returned to tell of the larger world,

I rode the wind north and south beside the great river,

houses desolate as if the saints had all vanished,

people’s brains dwindled by trivia

to dead twigs, dark as coughed-up blood.

Death cannot humble them,

nor set their feet upon the earth

while spite casts dark rancor across their faces.

Behind the walls of the crumbling city

one cannot hear the whispers of bamboo.

People eat, drink, shit, and piss imprisoned, seeing only

three inches from their nose.

Compassion’s lost with joy,

our land lost with our spirits.

We’re miserable, lonely ghosts

roaming a vast wilderness,

blown here, blown there,

hating each other, envying.

I’ve forgotten the radiance of sunset amid shadows,

forgotten the pungent rivers, these walls, broken like us,

painful to behold. Forgotten

we were leaves once, paired on a single tree.

So much life spent under cruelty, tyranny,

our gaze gone blank, our virtue famished.

Strayed from the path, so many souls dried hard.

Pierce, sharp stars, these bloodclots in my heart.