
Night [Free Verse]
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a butterfly hangs
upside down,
but it seems upside down
is as meaningless an
an abstraction for it
as the two million km/h
that a human sweeps,
spins, expands, etc.
through space
is for the person who
feels only the couch
against his backside.
what must it be to not know
upside down -- to feel free
to fall, knowing the air
will catch one?
A gorgeous day:
the sky is blue;
the air is crisp,
and a bird swoops in low
over the field to land
in search of insects.
The sign is kind of a bummer:
It tells me that 13,000
people died here --
most by shitting themselves
into unconsciousness.
(it doesn't use those exact words.)
This is Andersonville --
site of a Civil War prison camp.
Here, I believe in ghosts.
I don't believe in ghosts
when drinking my morning coffee
at my dining room table.
I don't believe in them when I
turn off my bedside lamp.
I don't believe in them anywhere --
anywhere else -- really.
But here they vibrate up
through my boot heals,
and I fear I may
shit myself.