A Missing Story

 

Desert junkyard cars, 

roughed up. Gutted engines.

Each rust spot, a missing story.

Dust blows its dry breath.

 

There are memories,

like knotted threads, of things

I refuse to call back.

I reach for hope, an afterlife,

a pain that feels alive.

 

An on the move hawk, low

flying, offering shadow,

chooses whose life

to siphon: reptile, rodent

a flush of black birds.

 

The warm wind is not enough

to cool this blistering.

Like a dead wire cut and dropped,

I’m drowsy, the heat moves in.

 

I daydream yellow eyes

of predator. Fearless

explosion of speed. A snake

jerked into the sky.    

 

Partly wounded, grief,

the sun’s razor slicing my skin.

A staggering memory: you were the feathers

plucked from my mouth.

==================================

from my unpublished manuscript: Fragmented

©dah / dahlusion, 2018, 2019 all rights reserved

first published in Gravel Magazine  

Reviews

[jacob erin-cilberto]

well, damn...this is really good...the feathers plucked from my mouth....such allegory.
I stop at places like this, junkyards...and just stare...imagining all those wrecks in full blown use...just like walking past an old factory that stands abandoned with broken windows...
in disuse...but once a bee hive of activity..
and when looking at our memories of a someone who is gone now...we do get knots in our throats and in our memories.
viciously full of stark imagery here...i think some of it actually cut me and made me bleed.
j.

[DAH]

Thank you, Jacob! I'm happy that it works for you, and that you can relate. Love your feedback on this one. Solid!

Cheers,
DAH

[Ted Kniffen]

Man, if I wasn't thirsty before reading this, I certainly am now. A grand allegorical take on love. The old cars provoking memories jolting to life the threads of a past love. The hawk choosing its prey...not really
discriminating...just hungry.
The memory brings a remembered rush of heat that not even the warm wind can match. At last, the last dead wire is cut and the memory is once again consigned to the past...but the wounds reopened reminds who was hawk and who was prey.

P.S. never did much like knuckle busters.

A good write, DAH

[DAH]

I'm glad that I've made you thirsty, Ted, and what an exquisite review of my poem. I'm honored by this breakdown, and I learned something about this piece, too. Thank you!

[Dave Brown]

this is all wonderful stuff
I strongly relate to the rusty old cars and the dust
I am a car nut and have spent countless hours, on my back, in the dust, salvaging parts from rusty old wrecks
No feathers in my mouth, just dirt and rust particles
This was a beaut

[DAH]

Thank you, Dave, for these kind words. And yes, I've spent hours on my back beneath old junks, too. So I can relate to your words.

[John Alexander McFadyen]

From the outset the hot desert junkyards set this scene for me as a dry place full of 'bones' as we pass things never knowing their provenance and the lives that went on in and around them. The knotted threads of memories I relate to as memories become entangled and difficult to straighten out, and those feathers plucked are such a sublime allegorically significant image all together!

[DAH]

John, thank you for this grand critique. Nice to read that you relate to it.

Cheers,
DAH

[Kay Salisu Titilola]

I like the settings of this writing.
The words are perfectly composed.
I could see the picture painted so well.
And I really enjoyed reading it.

[DAH]

Thank you, Kay, I'm flattered!

[Anne’sRants]

I love the imagery at the beginning about rusted old cars that used to be so much more. They take on a life of their own. “there are memories, like knotted threads”- people are messy. It stands to reason that those memories that make them who they are, are knotted and messy too. Love that visual. Nice write DAH

[DAH]

Anne, I love your take on this one, your critique is solid.

Thank you!
DAH

[Pete]

wherever we go and whatever we see, there is a story, a memory wrapped within. i like how you take us to a seemingly harsh, barren, unforgiving place and weave us into the threads of a memory which is triggered and we become a part thereof ... :)

[DAH]

Thank you, Pete!

I had stopped at this desert junk yard to fotograph
when suddenly my not book came out and I sat down in the sweltering heat and blazing deseret sun taking notes that, somehow, conjured an old lover, her leaving me, or us leaving each other. The notes turned into this poem.

Thank you for this critique!

DAH