The Sword in the Scabbard

~ kshawncat

Remember,
everything passes.
Humans, onion skins,
and apple cores are born

cast off
cast out
cast aside,

and in passing through
the turnpikes and elbow joints
of our handmade sewage ways,
or the cervix and labia
of our handmade bodies,
arrive like pachinko balls
slotted in suburbs, city centers,
or prairie towns, naked.

It’s not our reward,
and it’s not our punishment,
this curly-grained lay of the land.
It’s the chance encounter;
it’s the turn of the screw,
a game we’ve made it.

From a donkey born,
a unicorn can grow.
And unicorns can harbor
shriveled, beat-less hearts,
as donkeys can pump
fierce oxygen-rich dragon blood.

So, gutter born or mansion raised,
we all started life in a pear-shaped organ
between the bladder and the rectum,
our handmade sewage ways,
in a town called Corpus.

—————————————-

˚for poetry picnic week 21 go check it here˚

Published by kshawncat

Writes, reads, directs, documents, listens, embraces, stares, forgets, and edits.

22 thoughts on “The Sword in the Scabbard”

  1. Fantastic weave Poet! Love the barn yard yet whimsical imagery (quite a feat actually…you really make it work) Will you be linking it up with dVerse today for OpenLinkNight?

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  3. Pingback: Nomination…Whaaa? :-) « knockaroundmeg

  7. well done. i like the premise you set up here, stays very solid all the way thru. every stanza is self-contained and independant, very controlled and polished. a pleasure to read

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  10. A pragmatic and interesting take on life and meaning (if there is one) ..I like these lines:

    It’s not our reward,
    and it’s not our punishment,
    this curly-grained lay of the land.
    It’s the chance encounter;
    it’s the turn of the screw,
    a game we’ve made it.

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    Reply

  11. Strong poetry here. Imagery is top notch. Love that you managed to get everyone naked. I live in a prairie town and I don’t want to see most of these people even if we all came from the same place. 🙂 Love it

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  18. This is magnificent. There is a classical feel to it, as if the words, once said, will echo down through years into time, catching readers and listeners over and over again.
    From a donkey born,
    a unicorn can grow.
    And unicorns can harbor
    shriveled, beat-less hearts,
    as donkeys can pump
    fierce oxygen-rich dragon blood.
    There is both warning and hope in these lines as well as in the poem as a whole. There is also the sense that life is life, which leads forward to death. Congratulations on having the skill to write this.

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