The Oyster Song

LISTEN or DOWNLOAD this poem. The Oyster Song read by Josh Kight.

The Oyster Song

Discarded oyster shells piled
By the Lynnhaven river, had been roasted and opened
Making comical mouths, screw drivers had finished the job
We didn’t know how slow the joys were.

Now I grind the sweetly singing fates
Between filled molars
While they view us in cool grace.
We twitch with the wounds
That they decorate our souls with
Clubbing us faster and faster as we age.

The people I grew up with
Are now more marked than smooth
The body breaks in to pieces
Barely held together by a fleshy bridge
That crosses secret rivers to the mind.
The lines of deaths and losses
Spin in the eddies and swirl to the bank
Half sunk in memory folds
Where you can see a foot here
Or a finger there
Protruding from the sand.

Faster and faster the fates club away
Beautifully thin robed torsos
With smooth marble arms that never tire
Archaic smiles that never fade
Eyes without pupils hard and holy.

And for us …….

The days go numb
Like a Mesmer dream
We are plastic to the touch
Moving without walking
Talking to the air
Vacuuming with our eyes
Our laughs are more like coughs
Convulsing sore lungs
Leeching oxygen from thoughts
So that visions move under our skin
Like bark beetles
Not ready to reveal themselves
Before devouring the tree
The waving novocained flowers
Sway drunkenly
By insistent waters
That split and wreck their forms
On rocks who refuse to soften.
Trees in Shock, drop leaves
Under static clouds.
Her majesty the mountain is forced to her knees
And what is vital and sloppy
With joy grows quiet.

“What say you my slimy friend?” I query the oyster.

The oyster sings:
“The dark forces that hold sway
Ain’ gonna jack my juice
Ain’ gonna rock my roost
Ain’ gonna steal my poor heart away.”

All I have left is a slit eyed stare
That I turn on the fates.
I bite the hand that bleeds me
That breeds me
That gives me this hard hand to play.

The table has been cleared
Of nursery rhymes
And love’s guiltless crimes
And the happy simplicity.
Now to find the underground springs
There is a weighted pack to pull
Across the dry ground.
The digging must begin before midday.

The oyster sings:

“Don’ need the pain
Don’ like the blue
Feet sunk in the goo
Bein’ happy shouldn’t be such a strain

Where do ya think we get pearls?”
I’ll tell you:
Layer upon layer of rejected love
Covering the pain with glove after glove
Creating smooth shining little worlds.”

“Look at that pile of bodies “the oyster said
“There is truth
You have to swallow thoughts
To have thoughts
You have to eat muscle
To have muscle
You have to consume soul
To have soul.”

“When the fates push you down that last mile
You’ll feel your husk too being put on that pile
But they won’ steal your poor heart away.
Y’see heart and soul are wrapped
Like a jelly roll
You get to take it with you
When you go.”

Joshua Kight 1/6/ 2010