You brought me cigarettes.
I brought you cough drops.
Wounds were disclosed little
except in momentary darkness
after darkness.
Those shades brought light in
for quite some time.
News has been flapping over:
grey rockets, grainy planes…
Our bodies——palm glades,
our bodies—–sands.
Tent life too occurs: spirit dwellings,
cathedral canteens,
stucco, thatch, bricks.
Our faces peer clear
from such mottled dots.
You send letters I can cherish
like no flag.
I send a hair lock
as if it were a parachute.
In transition, times’ crazy waltz
passes our photos around.
Have you heard?
Mine eyes have seen.
Translate broken languages,
our hybrid tongues,
our multi-racial pasts.
There’s such fertility here,
such peril, and both signify change.
Different you will be and me
I expect too
though the altered love
goes just as deep.

—

A resident of NY, Stephen Mead is a published artist, writer, maker of short-collage films and sound-collage downloads.  If you are at all interested and get the time, click on “Stephen Mead Art” for links to his multi-media work.