When cities crack, do stories too,
their scaffolding
collapsing?
Then I trawl the fragments lying disarranged,
searching, this side and that.
Emerge, ashen,
fragments limply
dangling
from upturned palms.
When cities crack, do memories too,
like china heirlooms
smashing?
Then I crawl into the folds of memory,
lifting,
calling,
tapping.
Searching for the missing,
never finding.
Brushing, carefully dusting,
only ever finding
skeletons of silence
cobwebs of sound.
When cities crack, do people too,
their lives
disintegrating?
Then they seep slowly through the cracks,
drip drip,
only brittle vessels remaining.
Then I come with upturned palms of stained
– scraps and chips of –
glass,
bits and
– collage –
pieces,
mosaic pictures hobbled together from fragments.
Here, I say, I’ve salvaged what I could,
your stories,
and then capsize ashen palms into cracked vessels,
everything together
lumping.
“I’m sorry it’s so disarranged, like ravaged cities
cracking.”