A Fall From Grace

by Rochelle Cunningham
© 2009


First on the scene, the last one in bed.
Right up to the edge, and left at the next chance.
Tomorrow may not wait – will you?
Like a promise hanging from the back of your throat.


When the wailing ends, tears dry in a wrinkled trench.
What if the cure is worse than the disease.
Is it time to let go? Time to watch it disappear, to fall from grace?


Death whispers, like an icy breath on the back of my neck.
The more I learn, the less I understand.
And emptiness fills the hollow spaces of my mind.
Lifting the skirt of life, exposing her secrets.


Bind the pale light with a knitted lead ribbon.
Guitar strings break the rhythm, and darkness bleeds through.
So let it go. It’s time to let go, to disappear from grace.


Come back home, come to mama. This time you’ve gone too far.
Conversations never happen, secrets die between the lines.
It only matters if it’s true.
Fill in the blank spaces with smoke, with gentle smolder.


Wake up! You drifted off to sleep in a heat wave
Who wanders around in a brown sugar desert, dripping of humility?
Let go. You have to let go, to fall from grace.


I don’t have it anymore, it ran through my fingers long ago.
Messages a million miles a minute, trampling our souls.
With heavy hearts they ride around on iron butterfly wings.
And charm and grace were last seen playing alone.


Lost in a moment, dripping like honey from a rain barrel.
Lick the blood from your lips, and hold your cards up.
It’s time to let go. It’s time to fall… to fall from grace.