
Out
on the street
the earth is
all hard surfaces,
no place for the lion
or the lamb to lie down.
We dis-possessed are
foundlings feeling our way,
dissenting with
our very bodies,
our futures already signed, sealed,
& delivered with the swift kick
of the move-along boot.
But despair not, pilgrim,
for your freedom flowers
with every no-I-won’t
every sorry-I-refuse,
and Nirvana is just one block
over (if you don’t die laughing
at your sorry-ass karma
first).
So here’s to the wayward, the wary,
the weary, and to those who
wax poetic. Here’s to the famished
lion who refuses to eat the lamb.
First one breath, then another:
this is our mantra. Just one more
step and we are
nearly there.
Tim Rudolph is a poet living in Santa Cruz, CA.