It is the asking without favor or direction intended to make sense beyond what is felt and needed, what is retold to weave a corner of thought outside of the twisted raven hanging in the winter tree, as if this image takes care of insult and statement — a corner of thought hanging in the air just outside of reach of the swarming bees. Perhaps, it is a lie and a telling without really lying, fantasy transforming the idea into a powerful, yet silent dance that is aware of every fault and weakness inside its composer, the inquisition forgotten and the reply sought on paper. If this happens, there could be a novel. If it doesn’t take place, the poem is the horror of waking up in the real world.

When the sentence realizes the gangrene of shadow becomes the child of the open palm, it must end in a variation of itself, giving the words time to mean something totally unexpected because this dodging is the post-20th century comfort where assumptions are written down to take the reader elsewhere, so the witness can avoid the twisted phrase that reads, “The great journey took the Spanish horsemen north, so they could die in the desert.” This sentence concludes with the opinion, hidden in purple clouds, that today is not the right atmosphere for telling the truth, but simply an organic dish full of a computerized alphabet that has left the dirt roads behind. How this group of sentences is accepted depends on who is thirsty and who survives, their invisible instruments changing the sentences once again, until a long, wooden table steals the story and creates a hot meal in steaming dishes that await alongside rows of empty chairs.