Stone

 Thinking today of the LA fires.  And of the hearts of those, like my sister, whose homes have burned.

Stone

Today I am a stone,

blackened by flames,

scarred by windstorm,

and buried by ashes

that are memories

of the rains 

that never came,

the river gone away.

Today I am a stone,

left as rubble

in a landscape lost.

I can see only dimly

through the smokey air

where the sky used to be.

I can see only dimly

through the bregrimed

window of time

where memories reside.

Today I am a stone.

I ‘ve lost the touch

of hands, eyes or tongue

on photos, clothes,

records, paintings,

books, plates,

baseball caps, 

funeral cards,

pencilled papers

that only yesterday

were the relics of souls,

the watershed of journey.

Today I am a stone,

brain thick and heart slow,

mute, deaf, and alone.

I’ve lost the sky,

I’ve lost the river,

and though I hang onto life

now it proceeds

only down in the deep,

only down in the dark,

and only there at rock 

and geologic speed.

Today I am a stone.