Lisa Ray Instagram – Look at me says the world with a harlequin grin. A man is carrying his shards on tv for the giant maws that open wider while someone changes the batteries of the remote. On another screen Mara resurrects in calligraphic roars a primal cauldron of savagery and pelting chants, as a river of tongues- all pink, plum and un-iridescent hued- bay for the Dream House. We watch the covenant collapsing under its awnings like cardboard dreams in the thousands. And here, another bonfire of grief cheap plastic sandals falling away in rhythm as he walks, bearing the bodies on thin brown ankles while the keywords of the nation are laid like elephant bones across the burning sky. Ducking, dodging, mourning, adapting whatever comes next- What’s after ‘safe distancing’? And how to hear the careless whispers of our palms when the kindness of monsters has reached the other shore when there’s just not enough oars. ~ You think you know this world Asks the crow Who appears quietly As paint drying And speaks like an ancestor. You watch the fibre of your fate Disappear down his throat Nibble by nibble He will not be overlooked. Gulps And then what does he say? Stop projecting Unhappy endings When wild jasmine blooms On battlefields And the songs we need smoulder in ditches of mustard gases There are ancient forests in your eyes That have seen more Much more You call this an ending Only if you are looking for one When the smoke is stored in shadows and memory cabinets You will cry like me at the frayed edge of every morning For there is no safety from beginnings The trick, he offers as he swallows The last branch of my lifeline Is not to see it as betrayal But an eviction From the mad tyrant’s court And a return to the wetlands of pilgrim hope and stubborn human hearts – Lisaraniray @protestpoet Image @barbarichphoto