Hand-in-hand
I move hand-in-hand with the dark.
Darkness measures me, as a mother measures her child,
as a father measures his weakness, as a sibling their position.
I hadn’t licked, what needed be licked;
I only sliced and spilled, and plunged forward as a thrashing sea.
All the towers did topple, under the glare of my eye,
the roar of my wing.
For darkness, it lives here,
just here under my hat.
It grows from out my fingertips, to sink claw into the earth,
to set my grave apropos.
I have done enough damage now. I can sleep. It is over. It is done.
They say there is no rest, for the wicked
just one long death, and a sink, so loathsome.
First published in Nicholas Gagnier’s Swear To Me anthology October 2017. This is this poem’s first time appearing on this blog.
Renwick Berchild 