Encased Oasis

I can’t wait to be a kid again. When this life is worn through like the sole of an old shoe,

May my soul spill out from the seams with a vigour of life’s’ growth and deaths’ decay

so that I might find myself somewhere in the middle for a moment

and treasure that blissful blip of blue.

Of skies expanding over a stage of my desires’ unspooling demise.

Be at peace in the quiet that coats my cracked bones like a thick, oozing plaster;

filling in their sharp points so no longer may they draw blood,

suspending this vessel in an encased oasis of my time away from the world.

When I return, in a new place and time with eyes fresh and unscathed, and soft fleshy hands with no good claws to scratch with, with no good teeth to bite with

I’ll cherish every harmony in the whistling of the birds that bless the trees

I’ll follow the cracks in the concrete on stumbling knees to see if I can reach

some inkling of salvation’ peace in this open ended opportunity.

I’ll learn to love with the sweetness of eyes softened in the twilight,

not the bitterness of knowing scarred skin will only fade with time,

but there’s a permanence to the phantom sting that sews you to that mind.

A mother

A child

A cat unspooling twine

I’d say I’ve forgotten but this rain’s washed away my lies.

I can’t wait to be a kid again,

I can’t wait to turn this grotesque longing into genuine, juvenile light.