The Stone of Fear
by Gideon Burton
Come here and place your hands along the stone
of fear. And feel its cool relief, the breath
of sympathetic coal, of rivers sewn
with threads of night into a salty mesh
of swallowing. The patient nerves explode
in silence, frayed with razored fire quick
and coarse. Remove the moonlit cover, load
each palm with oily pitch, your skin grows slick
enough to ripple in the very scent
of hair, and every felling stroke betrays
the origins you’d long suspected spent
and empty, lacerations in the grey
of graces. See them rising, moon and stone,
each sentence pregnant, visible, alone.
of fear. And feel its cool relief, the breath
of sympathetic coal, of rivers sewn
with threads of night into a salty mesh
of swallowing. The patient nerves explode
in silence, frayed with razored fire quick
and coarse. Remove the moonlit cover, load
each palm with oily pitch, your skin grows slick
enough to ripple in the very scent
of hair, and every felling stroke betrays
the origins you’d long suspected spent
and empty, lacerations in the grey
of graces. See them rising, moon and stone,
each sentence pregnant, visible, alone.
Feel free to copy, imitate, remix, or redistribute this poem as long as you give proper acknowledgement of authorship
Photo: "Moonset" by Clive Shaupmeyer
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