Rubbing the chalky white from your painted cheek,

This is your blood that’s calling. This is Me.

Morning glories once bloomed, where lizards walked ivy tightropes.

It was the Spirit of Louisiana.

Step back- to the days when the heat graced your back and the anoles ran free along the fence.

Remember the taste of those morning glory blooms and the smell of the thick, soggy grass.

The mosquitoes would hum a melody, as the day would give its last.

Now those days are gone, yes the sky has fallen.

And I’m just a tangle, in a cosmic afro,

That is constantly being picked.

I am just a crease

In a plump bottom lip.

Being bitten.

I am but a freckle upon the face

of a universe that’s ever folding over,

Ever folding in upon itself.

Cards hit the table, and drinks are spilled.

And in the time it takes to pick them up

And deal yourself another hand,

You may find yourself reborn.

Because at the heel of all destruction

There remains a peace, often unseen.

The kind that levels mountains. The kind that stops streams.

This peace is not the quiet, the calm we’ve been taught to expect.

It’s the crater. It’s the bruise. It’s the stain.

But it’s a teacher.

And our trip has always been the very same.

Because we are just tangles, and freckles, and creases

Upon the face of all things.

When all of creation realigns,

And animal nature is harmonized,

All that’s lost will be found, all that’s ruined will be made clean.

And our mental, chemical chains

Will drop like Christmas rain,

In New Orleans.