Sleepwalker

I heard the tiny clicks of cicadas sounding 

with memories latched in torn asphalt 

clinging to the shoes of remembrance. 

Stamping my toes onto the concrete lawn

I counted the lines contracted in the pavement,

closing these eyes while smelling the air. 

I was dead long before I stood. 

Rotting where I once had crawled. 

I now had words in my ears, ringing: 

"You are beautiful. Your words are like fire. 

Send them up into the night as smoke signals, Hexed." 

"Summon your Heroes." 

"Do you know that I would die for you? 

Do you know the power of what you speak? 

You are so oblivious to your worth. 

Your dreams are marvelous. 

The world needs to see you!" 

Her Hessin voice lingered.

Funny how two poets talked late into the evening, finding love. 

Kissing the petals of wilted hedges when saying, "goodbye." 

Counting my work as the last stand against life. 

Counting the days away until I died 

leering into the treetops for serenity. 

Clutching sweat in restless hands  

ravenously chain-smoking, 

trying to decipher the future, lost. 

"Who am I? I am no one..." 

A mysterious friend came hurling into the night 

quoting Jack Kerouac: On the Road. 

His words passed unto me as I stayed entranced in grieving: 

"Rise Frogg, rise beyond the festering pools of despondent shit. 

Be Strong. Be Strong!" 

If I hear that word like "inclusion" one more mutha' fuckin' time, 

I'm gonna lose it, dear Caveat. 

It's easy for words to be shared amongst strangers 

without knowing the clear and present dangers of living. 

I inhaled the wildflowers of my mind. 

Damaged and split, charred and eschewed from the shade. 

Right there I knew, I was found. 

Right there I knew, about surviving.