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Thursday, 3 January 2013

Carolyn Srygley-Moore

Tell the Prisoner
·
Tell the Prisoner
there is a key.     He has locked his copy in a golden box.
What reasons are there to run toward the sea?
Earthquakes move us inward, or so I would think.
Toward the fresh water bodies.  Toward the finger sized black flashlights
that write in the dark but never die.

There is a talk of a big storm.       Some say it.
A storm out of a Stephen King novel.       Winds, pounding the shore,
lighthouses dissolving beneath the snow.   The search for light
begins, never ends. Light unlabeled.  Light unbroken.
Love, Love. I checked the morning news. One inch of snow
in Saratoga.       Blanket the horses.         Blanket the doves.

Tell the Prisoner there is a key.            He will feel manipulated
by the devils.          He will feel only slight relief.  He has more
reasons than ever to run toward that big paper balloon
called the sea.          It eats his features.        It yawns his face
into its suction cup            & takes him back
to the village        bicycles built for a thousand          back to his cottage
inland       where the lighthouse salts meat       where the dirty white dog
named Salt          walks around the circus poles       pissing
gentle relief.              Prison either makes you believe or pares
your belief from you.       I have been there.      It named me "who"
it tamed my cussing soul.

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