nothing gold can stay

along the scooping,
interminable road
with a fine red dust
that kicks up like facepowder
and turns all the brown latesummer leaves pink,
i walk.

one step at a time,
as if each step was the last time
i'd feel solid ground under my feet.

all the sunflowers on the side of the road
crumpled and suck-faced,
like denture-less,
rattling old men,
wheezing their seeds, suffering –
they peer down the road as if they know someone is coming.

 
and the loveless flea market
of smaller blossoms perched,
buttoned up,
they spin and toil,
petticoated in dust,
breathing through their mouths.
we all look up.
the sun cracking the earth like an interrogator.
all the muddy wet
spots from the storm that passed over two days ago
curling and separating
like continents.
the woods mumble.
the same woods where I saw harry townsend's family
distilling moonshine
and where the great dane
that was daddy's pride and joy
is buried in a gorilla sized plot
with a good christian crucifix at its head,
to bear it up
to wherever it is supposed to go.

if i stop for too long,
i can hear their voices,
the leaves with all the chlorophyll baked out of them
rustling and shh-ing
like mothers hushing their babies
and the spring gabbing in the ruts
and rusty inbetweens of stream-boulders
and skipping stones.

I hear them whispering to me,
telling me what a traitor I am.

my shoes are falling apart,
the heel flapping dully,
and the shadows in the woods cloak and mumble
like plague priests.