Poetry: Justin Robinson

Bloom







*


The landscape. A child’s face traveling between trees. He says the body recedes. Cracking branches underfoot. I shut my eyes. Leaves float the air, ripple the world between us. Step through, time opens new. He turns the way of wind. Slow moving, thin, I follow him. Sunbeams blind the frame. Infinite grains, arcs of light, break & gather in me.














*


His shadow leads. The shred of an arm vanishes from a distant corner. I am caught in the echo of footsteps. Leave time along. There he stands, brightly beyond my reach.

Searching, I fall open. Poorly visible, he passes through me, into the presence ahead. Torn features of a place. The child’s eyes. Receding space.














*


Wide is my clearing. The crossing of the field. A ray offers a way. Sand speckled underbrush. Constellations of all that I am. Blue dust on the knees. What is yet to be seen past the farthest things we see. Steep slopes, the heart he holds in hand, suddenly



                         slip

                                                                        into

                                             sky














*


Sight falls to skin. His wavering limbs. The valley branches ahead. He hurls forth a hand. Sore healed traveler, come to morning. In the finger furrows I root myself anew forever. Where rest seizes breath. No one is missing. Do you see. Through coils he takes me. Swirls of leaves. Two rocks



                                           drifting

                        past                                     the

                                           trees














*


Flits the motes of light. What we were rubs away. Yet warm is my body without end; his claimed by continual unraveling. Albeit, familiar the voice, his entrance from the exit, darkness behind the dark cloth of oncoming night. Becomes again a flood of stars. Bone splinters in the air. High up there. The beat of feet keep me falling. Soles striking sparks



                        as

                                                 we

                                                                       go














*


Ever the echoes I follow. Faint steps, dirt circles kicked up, earth’s insistence on running, ascending figure, frame, wound. Braided wind we’ll be. The taste of copper on my tongue. Death remembers everyone. His hand full of hair, head bent, here. I go to gather each thread. The fingers closing. Sight blurs. I glimpse him going



                        this

                                                              way














*


The path takes him taller. Audible growth I wake to recover. The farther he is, the deeper I hear. His restless voice skirts the meadow, strides a cut through the brush. Uncertain, I strike the brain candle. Seam rubs till lungs sprig out. Spiral slit in the side. Flesh’s unremitting ravel. He worms,



                         pushing

                                                         back

                                     into

                                                              bramble














*


The candle flame goes. Dust from the face I brush, endlessly into the air, earth torn. World born words drop his mouth. Raw retracting jaw. Everything left to say, blood spoken. No more fray. Unconstricted ventricle archways, lined with leaves, lilies. His hair & floating hands. There we gather,


stand














*


Edgeless trek, bound by stones, flowers on our bones. Lengthening limbs beneath moon’s encirclement. Traveling home. His voice unknots the door, detaches the forest floor. Shaking ground of light. Wake to it, explore. The after orbit a pulse



                        nothing
                                                           more—














*


Seeing increases, being ceaseless. Without world I yield to remembrance. Visitations at the snow trellised gate. Our arms through the latticework, linking silhouettes. Sheer breath. How return follows absence as essence, collarbone, cloud. What the hand cannot hold


goes—














*


Immanent exit no more than we’re after. Wind through the net we let row. Standing there, the world boughs back. Alive again ushers us in, uttering in us. Looking down at the feet, nearing new, gathering & again giving way. From song to stone, together, past blood flow. The mirrors that are



                        left
                                                to
                                                                        know














*


Stuttering to speak, he waves me across a door clothed in frost. Bandages from the throat peel off. What opens us in remains in the wind. Steps onto a hillside. Path rotted & watering down. Becomes a self again. Flesh I can touch. Urn in hand, he scatters a way with sand. Moonlit limbs, grain clotted, lead our feet.



                                            The

                                dead               we’ve

                                        yet       to

                                            meet














*


I touch his hand. His finger shoots the air. A figure waits beyond my fixed stare. It’s there. The slow boating out of me. Lidless flight through ash lands. Steps reverberate. Rest. The gating of another. Blood leaks.



                                    My
                                                 chest














*


The child falls. His legs etched in ice. Limping, I lift him. His limbs dead weight in the limitless expanse. Down the hill, the figure defined. Long hair strings the floor. My body shakes. We’ve been here before. A distant stone, marked by names, ladders large. Falling fruit we are. Seconds collapse. Earth opening door. We collect ourselves.


Evermore














*


Each step hammers the light home. Footprints in snow. Breath on the fallow. Beclouds his face. Buries a cheek in my breast. Looking no longer. The figure coats closer, losing gravity, lifting the child from me.



                       He’s gone to—

                                              Turns without word.

           Refusing world.

                                   Restless        we

become

were














*


Wavering gaze, free from stay. The after alternating life. My torn toes numb from running. Child in another’s arms, tucked & taken aside. Sailing surface.


They ride


                                                                       Speak

             Carry me

Iridescent we


                                                                       Under duress

Without wait


It takes


                                                                    The ancient site

             Soul


Breaks














*


Further forth, a tomb. My site wound. Every tree, snow covered. It happens here. The continual waking glance following the stone they fall into.



         The last

                                                                       Moment

                      Still

                                                            Blue

                                             A

                                  Tear

                                                  Two

                      Lives

                                                            Lived

                                                                       Straight

          Through














*


We walk together, birds & an urn full of teeth, where the stones meet. Eye opens.



            The

                                                                                Smell

                                             Of

                          Sea

                                                           Here

                                    So

                                    Continuously—














*


It’s the ever of sounds, streaming unbound


Led                                                                                   By

                                            Lead

                       Look

                                                                           Me
A

                                                Sliver

          Slow

                                                                       Silver

Brightening

                                                The

                                                                                    Reeds














*


            Near

                                                                                  The

                     Mend

                                                          Eternity

          Bends

                                               Every

                                                                                  Light
                     Reels

                                                                    In














*


                                                           Through

                        The

                                       Brainstem

                        We

                                                           Swim

                                          Begin

















“Bloom” is the opening poem in a larger, recently completed book titled Rose. “Bloom” journey’s through an internal landscape in an attempt to amend vital facets of personal experience, such as grief, death and memory. Coming to terms with these experiences through language has been the path of this poem and the book as a whole.






Jack and RitaJustin Robinson lives and works as a bookseller in San Francisco. He holds an MFA in Poetry from San Francisco State University. His recent work can be found in New American Writing and comma, poetry.

Post navigation