37/52: bone

There is little ice in the cracks and creases -
it is mid-December and the wind blows cold
over dead grass and leafless trees.
But not as cold as it could.

What is outside is not what is inside.
I feel winter's bony claw
tighten around my heart,
bone on muscle, jolting the rhythm

of all that is life
making the dark come sooner,
sooner than I thought.

36/52: waiting for a thing they do not want

Through my morning window
I see the trees standing black against the grey sky
naked and stark, and
I am looking for the metaphor for what this means.
They line up in the winter dawn
like Civil War soldiers waiting,
waiting for battle.

I imagine a bed roll over one shoulder
maybe a leaky canteen.
Hungry and tired.

There is no desire to move forward
no desire to move back.
They are just here
waiting.
Waiting for a thing they do not want.

35/52: a meditation upon meeting the wizard at the grocery

I saw the wizard in the produce aisle
but it was Tuesday, so he was not wearing his usual robe
the one with the stars and moons.

Nor was he wearing a top hat and tails
that would only be appropriate on Saturday night.

Nor was he wearing a long brown traveling cloak
and of course he did not have his staff
with the raven carved at the top -

it was only a trip to the grocery store
not into the wilderness where wild things speak
in a language older than time

and whisper of the true forms.

He was picking up avocados and gently squeezing them
in the palm of his hand.
He smiled when he saw me,
"You know they're ready if they yield
with just a gentle press.
Anything will yield with enough force,
so you have to learn to know the difference."

He replaced one and took another, paying me no more heed.

That was wizard talk, I knew,
for something.

I nodded, considering the meaning of the ripeness of avocados
as I made my way through the cereal aisle,
pausing occasionally to pick up a box,
feeling the give of the sides between my fingers and wondering
what might really be inside.

34/52: gorgon

I've been meaning to tell you
about the dream I had
where I came upon you
in a cave
by the sea.

You seemed to hiss, Whassup?
But I was fixed in place, like stone
when I saw the hoses coming out of your head
like snakes
but not.

They were, without a doubt
lengths of garden hose
raggedly cut off at random forearm lengths
writhing and twisting
in the wind
well, I would have said the wind
if there had been wind.

You looked like a high school mythology project
dreamed up on a Sunday night before it was due.

We walked out among the rocks,
rocks that looked strangely like heroes,
then sat together looking east
as rosy-fingered dawn unfurled...
her rosy fingers.

we sat without judgment,
but also without understanding.

I know, I know,
what were you doing in a cave
by the sea?

---

Audio: https://soundcloud.com/mbonica/gorgon

33/52: Illusions be gone

How does one love the river?
All that swirl and change -

the fish coming to the surface
then diving deep again

the star spark light playing
a dance from bank to bank
and down there - somewhere
on the way out to the sea.

How does one love the sea?
Endless, boundless

on and on the black depths
washing over shells and bones

out of sight of land
what is there but the sun
and water that will only make you
thirst.

How does one love the sun?
fickle in the seasons

in February cold and hard,
withholding

in August relentless
and punishing.

Wash away, drown, or burn away
all the illusions
of love,
my gods.

Elegant though you may be,
there is no gentleness
in you.

---

Audio: https://soundcloud.com/mbonica/illusions-be-gone

Video: https://youtu.be/IW0DbdHXc0o

30/52: the man, Rorschach

The day fades in from darkness
and we see a man leaning
against the counter in a kitchen somewhere,
coffee in both hands raised as if he were about to drink
but his gaze is unfocused at a point a thousand miles
past the cabinets it is directed at.

It is a moment for the opening scene of a movie

except someone didn't pay the sound engineers -
you know those guys whose names scroll endlessly
at the end while you are weighing the ethics
of picking up your popcorn and half empty giant slurp -
so there is no soundtrack.

What does this scene mean without the music
of this man's life?

He becomes a Rorschach test
where we impose all our own emotions,
triumphs and failures on him
and he doesn't even know it.

---

Audio:

https://youtu.be/7dDFGi95dLU or

https://soundcloud.com/mbonica/the-man-rorschach

29/52: equinox

This is the day when all things are equal
and we are ambivalent about coming or going.

The river runs shallow after the summer's heat.

I stand on the bank, feet dry,
in a place where, at the solstice,
the water would have stroked my ankles.

Present time runs down now,
down to the ocean of past.

I hold my paddle and consider my boat
resting on the grass gone to hay.

---

audio: https://soundcloud.com/mbonica/equinox
or https://youtu.be/p-UCRVdOYCE