An Exhortation On Some Lines.... Poem by RIC BASTASA

something is missing in your lines.
i regret to tell you that.
it does not speak well of yourself
or the world
or any moment, it is like a desert and all we have is space and
a horizon
there is even no wind to blow the sands away
i do not expect rain in the desert
but i could have seen a camel or a line of trucks or a
caravan

or even a Bedouin riding on his black horse with a scimitar

here i am again
in my worst self trying to tell you what to do so that you can be what you are

your lines are straight and too clean and that make them appear
dishonest
people love crooked lines and those that move in free directions
lines that are cold like the wind
and yet vibrant at night

not really dead, but simply grieving in silence for the loss of
someone so loved and missed.

i do not want you to change your lines, they are yours to
show,

i may be unfair wishing that your lines may be like mine
but mine are too sad and always sounding like a lover abandoned.

the beautiful lines are not clean.
they are imbued with our errors, erasures, blasting in our faces
like explosives

where shattered as we are on the fields of our disasters
only in a few seconds
we become silent spaces again.

mine are sad, and lonely and abandoned.
they are the only ones i have now, and so i must be compelled to
have them and love them
just the way they are.