Peter Casey

Icarus In a Wheelchair

Icarus in a wheelchair
Rolled out upon the tarmac to gaze again at the sky,
Memories of burning still turning within his mind.

She leaned forward
Her dark tresses dangling from under a heavy hat brim.
Lips, smiling like a Buddha with no hands,
Nipped his breast,
Driving recollections
Of molten wax and falling feather
Irrevocably from his own tragic history.

A flock of sepia stained gulls
Plummeted into the waiting sky.
As his callused hands rolled rickety spokes
Faster and faster past blinking landing lights,
Icarus held one perfect image of she
Within his terrified heart.

This laconic dream
Of kissing, of being engulfed within
Her breast, figure and loins
Awoke to
Scatter apprehension
As easily as wind moves through wheat.
Sinews that bound thumb to hand,
Hand to bone, bone to body,
Body to spirit found courage and fell into a rhythm
More certain than death or birth

Again Icarus flew

Peter Casey lives and works in Atlanta.