Twelve days

renewed in a cap and gown when graduation day, frothy, coordinated through distant relatives passed beneath the archway garnished, redent, unpopular with their cheering, cracked open when silver clouds fell heavily into the middle of your standing ovation, this campfire cause regains the hill by toasting marshmallows, willing therapeutic rivers to run sideways, breaking straws to different lengths and drawing them from my fist to determine whose advance warning shall be heeded, whose magic buttons shall be dusted and sewn onto whose lapels, will it be jerusalem or constantinople, artichoke or apple, when peeling ceiling painting of an ancient virgin stalls the walking tour for a moment of silent grief, that wonderful smell of plaster cooling until year-long shadows beneath eyes of mother mary fall to rest again, everything is dropping in for a cup of tea this afternoon, all and everyone, the guirdjeff shaven head cabalistic opportunity knocking axillary voltage through lines of copper between seven major eastern rivers on twelve days when blessings congretated, a small tribe of words, eyes closed and arms encircled, dragging toes in red dust as silent prayers, regaining the stage for an encore while the audience drains the last dregs of summer from their tanning bags, sharpening the wooden blade against the soles of their shoes, bleeding the air from their ripening flask, this goat's milk will be cheese when our journey has ended, or at least taken a pause, and we will eat, my friend, we will eat together again.