Hot Summer Sickness

 The hot summer sickness of the heart

Spreads like a sand storm

Across the desert planet of my body. 

Here in the sand are the ghosts

Of a pre-corona, pre-climate change childhood: 

The rubble that was the parks where I used to play,

The ghosts of the trees I had climbed , 

The cold blood of the friends who’s heads I had smashed with rocks and pealed with laughter. 

You are here too but

There are so many yous I forget who you are

You: curly haired snake charmer. Ethereal, fairylike. Precious as a secret. 

You: veiled oracle. Tiptoeing like the wind across dunes. 

You: brown sparrow on the branches of unborn trees. You have no name.

Do not look in the desert 

For lamps to  rub for metaphor 

Or the warm fires of imagination 

The desert has no life but ten thousand ghosts. 

I hope the sandstorm kills you all. 

And after it all

When I dig into the mirages that I know to be mirages, searching for the cool elixir-spewing oasis of verse 

I hope I find 

You:

Desert goddess of perfection 

The heart of my greatest poem. 

My rhyme, my refrain, my radif 

 

But I know I will not 

For I can only rot in the hot summer sickness of the heart.

There are no oases for me to find

In this desert planet of my heart and mind.

I reach through tiny telescopes towards the darkness of the night  skies 

Near the twinkle of the stars there are planets 

Red and blue and green 

What verses grow in their oases?

Who are their yous and mes?

Tell them,

Tell them to send me their poems.

Tell them to write to me 

Those who have found their greatest poems 

In the oases of their planets 

Or 

The elixir stars of their souls.