Brianne Holmes 

Mistakes were Made

Stretch that union foot by foot, inch by concrete inch.

We will hear of it

in yesterday’s news, certainly

by the day before yesterday.

This is unconscionable, we will say,

once we are wracked and curled

around an overpass.

Consult the stammering prophet,

who lifts his eyes to satellites

and reads the portents of three hundred million

strongly held opinions.

Cling to the future, go on;

but that history will stretch in one direction only—

toward a reckless wrecking of the clock,

deftly deafening the truth,

that mindless mining of the soul.

The Great Divorce

A parting glow that blackens trees

turns separate blades of grass to shadows,

different futures each,

which for an instant might have been—

or so it seemed.

The earth cannot spin back,

but what has been will be again—

but not, perhaps, for me.

Together we go walking through the woods

of pine and aspen, juniper and spruce

toward one great certainty of change:

to shaking off of mortal blood,

to sunlight on the other side of day.

Though what I lacked will not be counted,

though what I had did not suffice,

still what I gain will stand upon the earth.

Across the sky time stretches out,

an ancient tree with little sap,

a pitcher falling toward the ground,

a chord prepared to snap.

Water

Sunless waves sleep not

but seek pleasant mornings

and warmer shores

to the left of twilight.

Water is pale.

She hears sad tales

of perfection lost

in a land of rotten fruit,

ripening to rain.

Wake to the dirge,

bright with morning,

a young world, a new curse

an antediluvian vine.

Water is spent.

She crawls to her bed

and sleeps

while the new trees grow

over hearts of stone.

Sunless waves sleep not

laced in ice and curled

against the darkened

bookends of the world.

Water is gaunt.

She longs for rest

on far-off shores,

rest for the laborer,

rest for time.

Wake not the night

till Perfection arrives.

Brianne Holmes lives in Upstate South Carolina where she works in marketing and communications. Her writing has appeared in several publications, including the North Carolina Literary Review, The Twisted Vine, Monkeybicycle, and the Journal of Microliterature. Another of her stories is forthcoming in Relief.