Harbinger of Sedition by Geraldine O'Kane and Colin Dardis

I am a snail in Death Valley:
days eat into my soul.
the edge of the calendar forever on the horizon.

Each turn vibrates the same flat tune,
a silent crescendo against the gradient.

Mind does not follow where the tears flow;
vacant crawl in mud, impressions telling nothing.

A collection of secrets to be sold
to the canyon walls; no patch of ears
to blow seedling poison,
no sweet wind even, to cover my spilt words
that seep into the depths of my footfalls.

I see mountains in the silent pebbles,
an escape from the tide rising within.
My odyssey has been lost in the flood
of friendship and duty, a tied existence
that assaults my barren travels,
stifles each move, forcing a shadow persona
to shelter inside rocked escapism,
brittle as the tongue that breaks voluminous.

Mute memories seem to echo here,
rebound and mock the intelligence of my sanity.
I have lost my audience in this coliseum
and am at the mercy of people;
nefarious strangers in the prime of their strangeness,
who step out quickly to recruit and devour all participants.

Debased logic leads me to no snail’s land
where drifters lose; I am a waning moon,
a broken-legged horse pulled up,
courting the seconds in sequence;
waiting for the double-barrel loaded with silence
to sheathe the mind chatter, and recreate me.