GHOST WRITING

1.

Ghosts & Gossamers

There are threads

invisible threads in the air

all around

all the time

that cling to us

like loves

that won’t let go

that we can’t release.

They are finer than silk.

Stitches as thin as whispers.

I know a woman who can see them

who can touch them.

She can tease them out

of the fabric of a moment

and trail them

before you

with nothing but the pinch

of thumb and forefinger.

Do you see it? she will say.

And if you don’t

she will trace it out 

again 

slower than before

measure it 

more mindfully 

delicately divining the line 

so you can 

so you will 

see the glint 

and the glisten 

the shimmer 

in the blue of the bar-light. 

And then 

you do. 

Just in time 

with the tears.

2.  
Straw  

There's a point 
when the sound of absence -
which is not silence,
by the way -
becomes cacophonous. 

Or maybe it is like saying 
a metaphor, 
when used too often,
ceases to be sublime 
and begins to lose its power 
to elevate an idea 
and instead 
deflates it, empties it 
of meaning,
turns it into a hungry ghost, 
all quite by accident 
and due to bad timing. 

Or perhaps 
it is just simpler to say: 
longing is like a thread 
spun from gold 
back into straw.