Epigram ‘n Aphorism Samwiches

The Ice Boy At Winter Peak

In the attic of sentience,
a cave,
an echo,
echoes echoing,
angling off an aging structure.

Blown in insulation wall
pocketed asbestos --
hidden cancer
of memories spelunked, relived,
regretful adventures
beneath beams
of a two bed home.

Below the roof he sent
stalactite nails through 2x4s --
scarred my wandering head.
I hauled tarred replacements
in brown packages
up aluminum rungs at twelve,
witnessed handiness
as he laid
each one
down.

Shingles hinge to my brain,
tear, spin --
nails loosen where I walked
from access of the wintering apple,
snow drift to lowest limbs.
Clambered over soffits,
gutters, onto a snowy peak
in 30-pounds of gear

and dove and dove and dove.

White-packed boots and sock
froze from melt,
could not numb dumb joy.
An ice boy thawed
by the tv
with her steel
Currier & Ives sleigh theme tray.

Endless canned stock swam
in white glass, a sunny fat broth.
White caps bobbed, capsized
in mugged hot chocolate.
The best sleep, and dreams,
I would ever have.


4.6.23
48 lines, free verse

produced from Zoom writer's group instructional seminar, tonight.

What might seem clear are my sentences. What might not be clear is what those sentences attempt to say. I’m a poet following a trail of breadcrumbs back through life and making assumptions where I was diverted. Not clear how to walk it back. So, I write and write and  write like the little boy diving from his roof.