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Waiting, Waiting


by Darryl Price


The fear you represent is a real drag. That's all there is to say. But like every other house on the block I have spiders in the basement who are waiting to be brought up into the golden light. These creatures only want to be good at being alive. Instead

they are given a dangerous reputation to contend with. It's much easier to squash what you can never be. Some will mistake your neck for moonlight and settle into a feel good dreamscape of their own, others will rear up on their hind legs and dare you to play god.

That's a sorry wish too easily granted. Now apply that to the world around you. Things are more like paper than like stone. Every time you choose the easy route you have made the whole world one step closer to blinking out, even if you didn't mean to

(be so unforgiving in the first place). You are not king. There is no king, or there are only kings. Even a real king is not the end of all that is now because we are living in a spiral city, full of holes, that can collapse upon itself at any given moment, lost in time like sand.

Learn to navigate. You're allowed to know things. It's not too late to take back your misfortune in the garden, so we might as well get on with the quest at hand. The idea wasn't to get back, it was to get out, because free is free. Somewhere along

the line this was felt to be pretty well worth it--whatever the dangers ahead. So when you make your album don't forget to be involved in every last detail of it--don't leave it up to someone else to make the small arrangements for you. You've earned the right to

scream or cry or laugh as loud as anybody. And if they sit back and hate you with their stares they are the ones who are swimming in molasses. They are the souls blackening against the sputtering rocks. You are rising, rising, and finding it to be one beautiful ride through all those glorious clouds. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bonus poem:

 

Orange Peel

 

Just your shoulder could cause armies

to rise up out of the sands and clash. That

electricity alone will turn as many stars as

there are into pure desires. I can't help this.

 

It's like any small miracle. The

kind that creeps up on you and you find yourself

frozen with delight. You don't want to move for fear it will

vanish and have been something made only available

 

to certain senses

that tend to scurry away in sudden

unexpected moments like new spring deer. Anyway this

thing before you is my small token of thanks,

 

thanks for the flash of insight, for

the knock on the head of real solid poetry, for

the jolt of dreaming juice, and the lingering colors of all that

sky. Time's gone now. I talk too much. To myself.



Nowhere At All (Times Seven)


by Darryl Price


It's just an echo. Someone that 
I knew. I meant to answer you, 
stranger, but the stars kept ringing 
in my ear. You don't get any 
of it back. You just get to see 
the book closing in your hands or 
someone else's lap. Listen. I'm 
not sorry I kissed the moon. I 

had such light between my teeth for 
ages. When I would speak the most 
special words would come out glowing 
before melting back into the 
soaking wind like small animals. 
I got drenched to the bone even 
with an umbrella. So that sent 
message was never that subtle 

to begin with. Just an echo, 
but it made all the difference 
in the world to me. Because it 
was really a new song, but it 
sounded so familiar. And 
I began to hum my own soft 
version. I stood on tree limbs and 
calmly cast my fate with as much 

boy courage as I could muster. 
These things have a way of coming 
full circle back to us, looking 
for an explanation. Playing 
for fun forever was mine, but 
eventually even the 
gods and goddesses wanted sleep 
or more than enough money. That's 

when it gets lonely. That's when you 
can get lost. Because there's no one 
around to care. You're on, I used 
to say. You're on, I used to shout. 
Now I say it quietly to 
myself. They don't want to know. They 
all left the game when no one was 
looking in their direction, just 

because they felt guilty, or you 
know because they were hungry. I 
saw them in their windows smelling 
of bath water and moth wings. The 
passed-out sun promised to pick me 
up later that morning. I can 
still remember waiting alone. 
I waited a long time. I'm still 

kind of looking out at the world 
from that tender moment. So you
see echo or not it's only 
me. And now here you are. All the
things I meant to save and give you
have been torn out of my hands but
these few words. I know it's not much,
but I'm glad to see you again.


 

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