We carried with us

all the tools we would need

to undo things from our end.

Those in charge

sent ahead for the word.

The word would be go.

All along the road,

strung like rough stones on

a piece of string,

stood the people from the towns.

The towns were the

first to go. The fragile towns.

When night came

and we had heard nothing,

from front or rear,

we grew restless.

The moon hung above us like

a jaundiced tear.

The night was alive with

our exhalations.

Our breath suspended in the chill

like small clouds,

briefly beautiful and swiftly gone.

The word finally came.

With it our only hopes, yet we

could not move.

Our immobility became a fever.

The tools dangled heavy

in our hands like redundant arms,

superfluous and onerous.

The tools expected things we could

now no longer deliver.

Copyright © Corey Mesler, 2007

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