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Laura, Toucan Editrice

Thursday, July 19, 2012

"Arrows", Meghan McCarthy

Earlier tonight I watched God take
down all the signs on earth.
Eradicated the billboards lining overpasses
with stoic Denzel faces.
Lotions and lace hotline numbers,
Pit Bull holding Bud light bottles.
I no longer see your eyes
In their unmoving stare.

Call boxes removed
from archaic telephone poles.
Warnings of construction stripped,
fifteen feet by one inch—
Semi drivers guess clearances.
Duck their heads,
clench steering wheels when
car metals grind concrete above.

No one knows when to exit,
tree towers used as reference points.
No telling when cars yield,
when two lanes become one.
How many miles from shore,
where the mountain passes are.

Stray bums with their dog companions
stand in silence on corner roads.
Calendars fall off walls and die.
Lighthouses snuff beacons,
ships toss about like crumpled paper.
Even the summits took a nap,
retire from grandeur.
Sweep up their pebbles to a pillow
and point down to untouched soil.

Girls flip pages of magazines
searching for horoscopes,
meaning in the constellations—
to find wordless, glossy paper.
Fortune cookies lift
from Chinese restaurants.
Left to rummage take out
bags for wisdom hiding
in the shells of cookies.
Birthday banners from kid-parties
leave dismayed mothers to speculate—
where have all of the signs gone?

Your cryptic name etched
in move credits filed away.
No Bible chapters to pray for
then flip to
Daniel
the tear blurred chapter
seen over stalactites on bottom eyelashes,
dripped from spineless lovers.
Even God pointed his mighty finger at you.


Manifested arrows
prescribing a conclusion
are made invisible.
I don’t walk through doorways
beaten breast to find you
standing there
to feel you
a sign that it has always
been
you.

Just roads and tires
no distractions.

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