Bliss is a Flak Jacket

Hands done up in rose gold
You were a vision with a baby on your hip
And prone to meddle with crystals
As though you missed all other spiritual conduits

And as I’m hacking at a novel somewhere
Trying to comb the sparrows out of my hair
I’m thinking back about the time you read my palm;
And God, I hope you did it wrong

Bliss? Bliss is a flak jacket
Guilt is the shrapnel/coat rack I’ve since sought to expel
But I fear it’s clear that I’m not a shaman
So I’ll keep my “cosmic revelations” to myself

I watched a revolution choke and sputter
I saw depression try to kill my brother
I heard Leviathan was living in a lake up near the border states

And back, back off the back porch
There was a demon in the bonfire we made
So we formed an assembly line
To cart back buckets we had summoned from the lake

And even when all of the kindling had flattened
We were never certain anything happened
Besides the vestiges of smoke getting in my shirt
And smelling of the earth