Strip-mined

before

With your head in your hands,
and your heart halved and hoping
for something unplanned and almost unexpected,
you're mapping it out
while you wander about
and your small playground circles the sun.

All your dreams are undone,
and the hopes that you crafted
are gift-wrapped in smoke, wafting high from the fire
you trail behind,
burning threads that unwind,
spreading ash on the streets as you walk.

Your name written in chalk
on the sidewalk in front of
the house on the block, with the strands of white lights,
and the children ignored
as they ride back and forth,
bicycles made of metal and mud.

Steeped in soil and blood
from the battles you'd won,
and the afterparties in the homes on the hill--
now your notice is sent,
you're done paying your rent,
done with fastening flowered lapels.

So you climbed from the shell
that you shed in the alleyway
blinded by years spent in vain in the valley.
That city they built
racketeered you with guilt
and supported its walls with your shame.

But you left all the same
and the bloodhounds laid claim to your things
at the auction that sang your defeat.
Now your fate lies ahead,
but the shining sun spreads
over litter and still scatters the sand.

after

In your hands,
the dreams of a century,
generations holding on to your arms to be led.

But you fled
and cast them away,
crossed the white ocean plains in search of an immortal lie.

Now your eyes
have clouded with sick sincere
longing for days that are better off left in the dust.

Still you trust
that strange recognizable
surge of conceit in the tide that captures in its wake.

But your memories thrive--
you're not sure you'll survive--

for that fate lies awake,
lies and baits us and waits for us all.