The End of the Year.

the shape of things.

in the early part of the dawn

this year, or some year to come

as her eyes trace light crawling

across a bedroom ceiling,

she can almost recall being

someone else

she can see a shadow

from a lamp on a kitchen table

in a yellow house on a tree covered hill

drawing the shape of a bird on a paneled door

a splotch of paint on a whitewashed porch

in the form of a shadowy man

who will sneak in through the darkness

and stretch across a little boy’s face and arms

she can hear echoes of dreams

drawing timelines of moments

that will arrive some January, or June

she can feel the lonely ache

of a woman on a corner bench

as she drives past in traffic

in the early part of the dawn

she watches patterns

sneak across a bedroom ceiling

while they try to elude her

and she can almost recall being

someone else

© december 19.2011 heather brager

an omen.

we are a pendulum, forward and backward

belief and disbelief, knowing

the sun always rises

then sets in the west

my eyes are diverted to the sky

the silhouette of a large bird,

the pitch of his calls remind me

my heart thinks in symbolism

and my mind assumes

he is in search of carrion

I blink and the Big Sky

swallows me whole

a lost northern girl, consumed

by the firmament

quietly, I am smothered

in the belly of the tundra

and your tail lights compete

with the rising sun

© december 2011 heather brager