Chuck deVarennes - Four Poems

She reached inside me,
pulled out the stone
that sealed the cave I made of life.
Long slender fingers found the unseen mass,
let my white tipped flame
feed upon the clear air she blew into me.
I feel my soul's fire reach to that breath
and flow from me as healing grace.

Cold slant winter sun drives warm blooded
men to their bruising building tasks.
O sweat mother.  O night dreams warm
beside a shrieking phantom.  Call call
-peace and ease-  only  -strive on- in reply.

This wind shudders through my debts
and sucks the love from my chest.
I'm brittle broken, wanderlust arrested.

Home craving.  Weary road's
questions whirl through my bones.

Lean crows waiting watch
dizzy me by the roaring highway.

Day dreamers search frantically
amid rubble for some bauble
tossed against the wall
before all the bricks
broke on each other
tumbling down.

We're building a beautiful wreckage.
Neat gleaming waste package.
A large thick rug laid over it.
We sit before the mirror and beg
poisoned apples from the frozen radiance.

How many times can we
forget the world?
How many fat ego meals before
we are stuffed end to end?

Is this the end of dreaming?
Imagination killed by gleaming motion.
Color and sound dance around,
hold us safe  and  dull.
Necks comfortably await the blade.

It's one up   one down.
Fat phrases for thin glory.
It's child's play
big enough to kill.

Sun slants low.  Cold light
quells every spirit.
Strangled soul's cry
spent before a beast's ear.
We can't hear it.

We cut each other
in bone chilling sulight.

Nightmares flare over bright
lovely things which we
no longer value.
We fill ourselves and build despair
unknowing.

This is dreams' death:
our pockets empty,
nothing to worship.

"Hey op!  Unload this pallet of pipe for me?    Thanks man."

His hip hurts.
The ground feels
strange under his feet.
He climbs into the loader's seat,
where his instinctive talent
makes the machine
speak for his soul.
Merging mind and metal
carve up earth.
The yellow monster
roars his breath.

Red eyes read wooden stakes
and guide his hands .
The greedy bucket bites
and spreads the meal.
He sculpts the ground
to mirror some designer's schemes.
The op's ruined his lungs and ears
fulfilling those blue dreams.

The operator reads the sky
and rails against the coming rain.
Hot sweat bonds dust to skin.
Skilled hands make levers roll in dirt
to pack it down before the rain
turns it all to mud, and the thick
earth blood consumes his art.

Then he dismounts the glory seat
and slowly drags his weathered skin
far from the fumes which fire his blood.
Now he must wait for mud to dry
before the  big machine can cry
the song which pounds
his heart's rough beat.

We will stand together.

We'll let the rain drive
through our spirits' wrappers.
Ghostly golden trophy cars'
blind rush will splash us
with oily waves.

We will stand together
in this lonely work,
our frustrating duty.

We will love and curse
our compulsion to express
ourselves with hidden
exact beauty.

We will stand among the naked
children who dodge lightning.
We will hear the drunkards'
senseless songs.

We will feel the old
woman's rhythmic feet tap
mysteries woven with the threads
of twenty five thousand days.

Let's stand where
the fat rats scuttle.

Let's wait silently.

Baptized in blood,
bathed in the golden dream splash.

We will stand together in the flood.