Walk or Perish

18 November 2k18

“The Day the Flesh shapes and the Flesh the Day shapes.”  — Frank Herbert

 

Greetings, Dear Reader,
on 16 November I once again celebrated Life after Brain Surgery.
Twelve years: Feels like a lifetime crammed inside a hot-minute.
I adapted to being broken. Then something changed. It always does, nu?
I moved to an Oasis in Spenard; whilst through the blessing of CBD,
the seizures that plagued me for years were finally reined in. Sort of…
Blessings Uncounted.
So…I kicked that Wheelchair to the curb. And haven’t been in it since last Spring.

Eleven years is a long damn time to go on Wheels. I am still shaky, still sketchy.
But I have learned that with each step I grow Stronger…and Stranger.

 

 

 

Secondhand Scarecrow

 

I must go on walking.

Choices                                         are for those

   who have such luxuries.

We shall not speak of them.                    No, not here:

 

One step.         Crutch-step.       Two step.

Crutch-step

Back step.

S   t a    gg    e    r
-step.

 

Aluminum sticks                         splayed, guarding

against capricious                       Gravity, Her cruel insouciance.

 

Pain is no paltry obstacle

It is a taskmaster: the Instructor of Survivors.

Pain is a goad.

 

i.
Walk then.                                                       Walk

lest I become                                                   rooted where I stand.

 

Ah! But the temptation                                 …it is terrible.

To embrace the Winter                               of permanent Wheels, at last.

 

To become twisted—bone, tendon, gristle

into a secondhand scarecrow.

 

That boneskin-stickman

misshapen oak-man

of my unremitting dreams:

 

gnarled branches I would grow

to crook into puzzle shadows upon snow

to croon with ravens roosting

as Williwaw winds keen raw

 

frost-finger limbs I would form

to drum rattle-a-tattle rhythms

aside raise the dead

sky swept flurries

 

Guttural—my song                                                           to ice crystals

bitterly encrusting                                                            twig, bough, and burl

alike during fathomless                                                    auroral nights

grown like brutish spurs of bone

on the sockets of worn, arthritic joints

will echo the baying                                                          of outcast wolves. Caught

therein, under the spell                                                    of loneliness and moonlight

 

ii.
A taproot I would send                                                      down to Queen Persephone

on Her throne                                                                    in darkness built;

there to beg an Indulgence

for a small measure of Spring

come lavish, come too soon.

 

The weight of sunrise

on hoarfrost—

burgeoning nacreous, lushly white

when land and sky appear as one

shall incite                                                                              sleeping sap to flow

amongst fellow                                                                       trees. Transformed

into rime-laden                                                                      soaring sunsparkler cathedrals.

Standing sentinel                                                                    in clouds of our own breath.

 

Ever so,                                greenleaf sweet

or

grueling snow

I must go on walking.

 

 

 

 

 

 

DC McKenzie
16 November 2k18

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

::End Transmission::