Mist Cleanse
a foam of ants
faint like remembered hands,
smaller than the molecules
of memory in her pain.
everyone who ever intrigued
or mistrusted her
crawled uncensored here,
childish in the freedom
of a stripped and careless
physics.
it was hard not to want
their white amnesia,
their lack of face;
to let caricatures slay her
in a mingle so vast
it rubbed tame and serene.
airy sands
tender with phantoms
gnawed the reproach
of braided skeletons,
until dew elated
the songbirds in her mouth,
tinctured her lips with zest.
tears branched pure as swan wings
to lave her inner flight.
with newfound mouth
she asks, what dreams may come?
and yet it is only the mist,
fading in the riddle
of its own bruxism,
which dies.
Chris Crittenden lives fifty miles from the nearest traffic light next to a spruce forest. Some recent acceptances are from Barnwood, Offcourse, Gloom Cupboard and Xenith.net. He blogs as Owl Who Laughs, and his full-length collection Jugularity was recently published by Stonesthrow Press.
