Then I Walked Into You
Poem
I found a clay hut while the desert stormed.
Inside a monk sat on the packed ground Indian style,
chanting the blues of the Ancients;
centered soliloquist, unaware I laid prostrate before him.
Dust plumes my halo of welcome.
His eyes never opened to me.
I started walking and came upon rolling green and gold hills,
a sapphire ocean jeweled by sunshine where the deepest
warm breeze blew; a panacea for the thunder and sand in my veins.
I carried the desert storm.
The journey had been long.
A blue flower grew out of my heart that day.
I still have it.
It doesn’t need any water.
From behind me rushed a yellow cabbie.
It flew over the hill and into a metropolis of shining black edifices.
I walked on the empty streets as the sun made its bed
and all the flashing signs awoke.
Odd, no one was around to read them.
With every block I walked I heard the cabbie honking,
spotted him a few times screeching around a corner
some two streets away.
more by A. M. LAINE
photograph by Joshua Sortino
