Is
this the tree they call
the forest flame
fiery patches
brilliant arid red
interspersed amid the leaves
until they grow large
splash the whole green mass
with red
shimmering silhouetted
against the sky
at the gloaming.
How
I wish I could
bloom out, burgeon so
my blood, my heartache
the loveliest dream
lodged unseen within me
what makes my pulse beat
go fast, run at a gallop
the song in my bones
the lilt and thrill
that are quintessential me
break forth, burst out
covering from end to end
my quotidian self.
I’ll
have lived truly
in a brief spell of ecstasy
with no regrets for the dead nails
that I had swallowed
the putrid fish I had eaten
the stinking carcass
the rotting dung
that had entered my entrails
flowing out of me
once, Just once,
into the madness
of the forest flame.