THE COLLECTOR

Pictures bloom inside my head

Red spiraling trumpet vines

All the stories of the earth

Dreams dug deep in time

Black and white, and technicolor

Such dreams are hardly mine

Like a tree that's dug in deep

The roots exposed by time

I wander through the catacombs

Gold crypts of noble blood

I pour the royal jelly

Into the potter's earth

I heard once of an entrance

To another world

Searching for an exit

They dug into the dirt

City kids uncover it

Kicking cans and rocks

Lifting up the cardboard

On lost, abandoned blocks

Each time it is uncovered

You can feel the wind pick up

The images left on the earth

The whirlwind pulls back up

I am the collector

I dig down to clay

I taste salt water

I look far away

From blacklands, grows the thistle

I walk the potter's field

Our forefathers are buried there

The moon shines on Snake Hill

The drowsy tops of milkweed

Tip over in the rain

We spill a glass for all who've passed

And pour a drink again

They sailed the sea from Scotland

In man made silver fleets

Subterranean passageways

Their bones, the seabed keeps

So often I feel homesick

For things that are not mine

Black and white, and technicolor

Such dreams are hardly mine

Rosy moths and caterpillars

Climb through my memories

Pink blossoms of garden phlox

Slump over in the breeze

I have found an entrance

Through a picture frame

On the far side of the looking glass

Through time, I dig, again

For I am the collector

A shovel in my hand

I hold the things that are not mine

So they might live again.