red dust

i.

i love the pockets-full
of red dust
that you are:

a collector's
worth of archaeological
meteor-shower atoms.

that through my fingers
i might sift you
for a thousand years,

feeling the soft-soft
sigh of your breath
on my closed eyes.

ii.

you are of the uncommon
fires found in the
outest backs of the
wilderness of common men.

there, in the distance,
the shape of you is
bisected by the
cross-hairs of branches.

something to puzzle
toward, to be in
search of, to be too
far flung to catch.

that's a father's
prayer, of course; or a poet's,
whose pursuit is of the blood-stone
souls of far-flung words.

iii.

i'm tired of grace
and of words and
of the faith of men
and of time.

but i'm not tired
of you.

because one cannot tire
of watching the way
the moon commands the sea
from across the vastness of dark.

iv.

it is october, and things
have changed, but i
still go for walks and
talk to myself, mostly.

the maple is giving
up again; the ash and
the beech and the elm,
they're spending what they have.

it will be again soon
that i walk and can see
a better view of the moon
at night.

but it will be colder then,
and i will need to make haste
and go chasing my
breath toward the heat of home.

v.

when you look back,
be it toward something.

when you reach,
be it far beyond them at least.

when you take pride,
kiss it on the lips.

when you discover
joy, be it.

when you find that
place, remember how.

vi.

this man, full of
failed words,
and propped toward
pity more than he should,
loves you, pockets-full
of red dust that you are.