The Ring of Brodgar
18" x 24"
acrylic / canvas

In through the out doors
past the clock with wrong numbers
ticking endlessly backwards
beyond perspective and page,
down the long varnished corridors
of pipe tobacco terror
past the monument to failure as solid as rot.

Through the gates of the factory
where Deception's emblazened
on a banner of silk which seems never to tear
where machines of pale fortune
scream at the last remnant
and the words that are spoken
fall like dust to the floor.

Like a sad trapped weasel
I gnaw off my past
and slip through a crack between
Main St. and death
through a small door left opened
yet bolted on each side
past the guards dressed as parents
to the hill where men pray.

And wading through waters
where the red sun is swirling
through the ring of stones standing
where lovers decide,
I find a vagrant singing
with words that are my words
and inside his backpack
a clock that has stopped.