IV

Scan,
Scroll down,
A glancing blow
Flickers with the eye.
Turn over, and away,
To brittle mosaic
Of yesterday.

At the excerpted edge
Redacted shards invade
All clean white space,
Each staking their claim
In the day.

Left-facing first:
Universal cry of too many
Faces, remade as flags;
Red, green, white and black,
Solidity of brick into sand
Dissolves with shimmering asphalt.

Different worlds,
Within the same striking sphere,
Denies human distance,
Against broken back of summer
A steady trickle unites
More voices lost
In the next landslide.

Beyond ink, it still clings,
To hands otherwise clean
A fresh summer stain,
Where sweetness infects,
All bitterness evacuated,
No ventured regret.

They fell early this year
Pink and red
Where scattered sun
Massaged the new flesh
Green glass, driven elastic underfoot
Walking-out the hard-won images.

It comes again, a day in hand –
Another bloody mess.

Take a bite,
A minor bruise;
As half-moon,
Ignoring of the death.

Links

Part I www.shoutoutuk.org/2014/08/10/scale-part-adam–steiner

Part II www.shoutoutuk.org/2014/08/17/scale-part-ii-adam–steiner

Part III www.shoutoutuk.org/2014/08/24/scale-part-iii-adam–steiner