The Music Stops

The jaws sing As the drip, drip, drip, Of the petroleum chorus Dances across The inverted aluminum And the hissing starts And the hissing stays Its smell a warning A final omen Like the last rose Of summer Or the fragrance she wore For that final goodbye The teeth tear inward Like the regret for today And the regret for yesterday And the lament for tomorrow Its promise broken And your khakis red And baptized A stigmata To self infliction As the music plays constant And the rushing you feel An emptying of sorrow Onto the crushed ceiling Of a dream in reverse Of all life in reverse Until two arms grab you And you fall from the sky And you fall from the sky Waiting For the ground To coronate the outcome And for one more answer To a ‘why’ unquestioned And to love you one more time But the lights are now dim And the voices muffled As an organ can be heard And store bought flowers smelled And an old woman cries… As a young woman cries… And a stranger pronounces What you feared the most They didn’t know you And couldn’t know you The exit sign flashing But there is no door “There is no door” —and then the music stops (Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2016)