My Horses

I can only assume the horses died well,
considering the smoke coming from the stable,
and the smell of charred leather. Branches point
toward the distance, where the graveyard grass
recedes. Early-song dew dampens my hair
while voices laugh deep inside the mine.

The horses were never mine.
I drink, keeping down sediments from the well
for my iron deficiency. I spit out hair
that winds up in my mouth, feigning stable
trajectory and lying in the grass
once the sun has set behind the mountain’s point.

A sign with chipped paint points
up ahead, where a great stone blocks the mine.
Red deltas course slowly through the grass,
spilling downhill and filling up the well.
A rose-ring on a finger-stem— ashes, ashes in the stable.
My devastation kept prisoner by hair.

I dreamt I was drowning in a stream of hair.
The torched straw was melted down to a point,
and in that chamber I found that stable
was just a garment, a spectacle of mine,
an infantile thought raised so well.
I dreamt I was swimming in a sea of red grass.

Slit your tongue with a blade of grass,
stem the bleeding with a mop of horse-hair.
I hoped we might ride together, but knew well
that one of us would be sidestepping the final point—
nothing ever leaves or enters the mine.
Desire burned up with the stable.

I see no reason to build another stable
for things that ought to be free, tearing up grass,
galloping, galloping far from whatever’s mine.
Like a fatal sunset, I saw your hair
go up in smoke, extinguishing the point
with darkness, rupturing the well.

Thoughts sprout like grass beneath hair,
never straight, stable or quick to the point.
I mine the air for hints that I am well.