{"id":2734,"date":"2016-04-11T03:05:15","date_gmt":"2016-04-11T03:05:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fullofcrow.com\/poetry\/?page_id=2734"},"modified":"2016-04-11T03:05:15","modified_gmt":"2016-04-11T03:05:15","slug":"cleveland-wall-april-2016","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.fullofcrow.com\/poetry\/archives\/cleveland-wall-april-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"Cleveland Wall, April 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

F.O.E.<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The forces of evil\u2014<\/p>\n

the forces of evil are playing croquet<\/p>\n

and eating bon-bons and you,<\/p>\n

my friend, are far away.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The forces of evil are<\/p>\n

poking me in the ribs and making me<\/p>\n

drop things. They are making me<\/p>\n

forget my lines and you, my friend\u2014<\/p>\n

how beautiful you were to my imagining.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The moon has slipped out of its ring,<\/p>\n

got up to some mischief, I suppose.<\/p>\n

The ducks are all in a row<\/p>\n

quacking in terrible unison\u2014<\/p>\n

Come back! Come back!<\/em><\/p>\n

The forces of evil have set them adrift there.<\/p>\n

And you, my friend? And you?<\/p>\n

You are a long time gone.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

One day I shall rise up<\/p>\n

against the wicket. But now<\/p>\n

those forces of evil\u2014oh they are<\/p>\n

dazzling white, their white-picket grins<\/p>\n

so suave none can resist them, and you,<\/p>\n

my friend, were a fabulous idea that grew<\/p>\n

feet and padded into an ordinary house.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Drop-Out<\/strong><\/p>\n

Confessions of a Fallen Tootsie Pop<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It was early on I came here, not long<\/p>\n

after unwrapping. There was the customary<\/p>\n

brightening, the sharpened sound, and I<\/p>\n

was plunged into the warm dark almost<\/p>\n

silence, save for the odd gurgle or click<\/p>\n

(you weren\u2019t supposed to notice those,<\/p>\n

but we\u2019d all heard the stories, or if not<\/p>\n

heard<\/em>, then felt them). I remember<\/p>\n

the knobbly weight rolling over<\/p>\n

and over me, slicking away my edges,<\/p>\n

taking off my outer elements easily:<\/p>\n

meet-and-greet with saliva agents and<\/p>\n

Whist! off they\u2019d go down that fathomless<\/p>\n

dark river\u2014to where and to where<\/p>\n

and to where? I don\u2019t know. Pure energy,<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve heard, though that\u2019s bit<\/p>\n

hard to imagine. I came up\u2014three?<\/p>\n

four times?\u2014into the noise light,<\/p>\n

spit-shined glossier each time,<\/p>\n

harder and brighter\u2014that was the prize,<\/p>\n

supposedly: to shine as the emblem of your own<\/p>\n

yumminess. It was all right, but then<\/p>\n

something slipped and I lurched into space\u2014<\/p>\n

cool, fast, end over end; it seemed forever<\/p>\n

till I hit\u2014something even harder than teeth<\/p>\n

\u2014and I knew right then, before I stopped<\/p>\n

rolling and came to rest<\/p>\n

on this grate, the bond was broken.<\/p>\n

I\u2019d have no more truck with any<\/p>\n

pink mouth. That world was closed. I live<\/p>\n

in the noise light now. Sometimes the grate<\/p>\n

rumbles. The first time it happened<\/p>\n

I was afraid, but as no crunch ensued,<\/p>\n

and again no crunch, I came to enjoy<\/p>\n

those deepity tremors and the great<\/p>\n

shuffle and flurry of new motes<\/p>\n

that comes after. I have been<\/p>\n

consorting with all manner of particles.<\/p>\n

Some of them cleave to my skin;<\/p>\n

Some closer, insinuating. There is even<\/p>\n

a kind of wet here, more subtle<\/p>\n

than saliva. I should be sorry, maybe,<\/p>\n

for not fulfilling the purpose my maker<\/p>\n

intended, but I\u2019m not. And anyway,<\/p>\n

what good would that do? It\u2019s begun.<\/p>\n

The ambient salts have found me.<\/p>\n

Already tingling, I begin to swell.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Prophecy<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Crow and rabbit dead<\/p>\n

beside a rushing stream.<\/p>\n

I found them on the banks of Monocacy Creek<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

both complete, though<\/p>\n

the rabbit\u2019s head was severed,<\/p>\n

the crow\u2019s beak a black shiv between grass and wing.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The water was high and turbid,<\/p>\n

in a terrible hurry.<\/p>\n

The animals\u2019 bodies marked a perpendicular line.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I\u2019d been to the magic shop<\/p>\n

after mugwort for dreaming<\/p>\n

and here a dream fell ready-made at my feet,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

the sort of sign I was learning<\/p>\n

to look for: tell-tale<\/p>\n

improbability that gives the lie to the dream,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

dispels the glamour.<\/p>\n

Lucid then, the dreamer<\/p>\n

is free to shift shape and go where she will.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But this was not my dream;<\/p>\n

these signs could speak<\/p>\n

to any who chose to walk along the creek.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

More like the dream<\/p>\n

of the hero in a folktale,<\/p>\n

who asks the wizard what it means<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

and thus learns his fate,<\/p>\n

which he tries to avert<\/p>\n

and in so doing rushes headlong into it<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

because no one can outrun<\/p>\n

fate\u2014not rabbit nor crow<\/p>\n

nor walker in the wilderness of symbols.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Cleveland Wall is a poet, editor, and mail artist from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, land of crows and freight trains. She has performed her poetry at venues all over the Lehigh Valley and on both coasts. She makes tiny chapbooks and curates poetry events for the Allentown Arts Collective.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

F.O.E.   The forces of evil\u2014 the forces of evil are playing croquet and eating bon-bons and you, my friend, are far away.   The forces of evil are poking me in the ribs and making me drop things. They are making me forget my lines and you, my friend\u2014 how beautiful you were to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":934,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2734","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nCleveland Wall, April 2016 - Full Of Crow: Poetry (Archives)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.fullofcrow.com\/poetry\/archives\/cleveland-wall-april-2016\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cleveland Wall, April 2016 - Full Of Crow: Poetry (Archives)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"F.O.E.   The forces of evil\u2014 the forces of evil are playing croquet and eating bon-bons and you, my friend, are far away.   The forces of evil are poking me in the ribs and making me drop things. 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