The Dirt

I followed you to a grave of stones—
the moon washed us out and remade us.
We stayed there our whole lives,
and waited for them to come.
We waited for them to come.
We let them tell us about a home
with golden light and floors of loam,
where we were born and lived and died,
over and over and over again.

Once we were a woman,
draped in silver and Spanish lace.
Our black hair fell like water
to the floor and down the hall,
until it covered our lover and smothered him.
Our children laughed and shrieked in the garden
and we watched them from above,
swinging softly, swinging softly from our hair.

Branches reach up, escaping the earth.
The scribble of black limbs against the sky
is a language we no longer understand.

And they warn us,
and they warn us.
“Don’t return to the dirt,
don’t return to the dirt.”

Once we were a child,
gathering stones to fill our pockets.
We climbed down into a hole
where the stones were bright and shining
until the stones became bones that pulled us below
where we lived forever underground,
birds crowing and shrieking in the world above
while we sleep softly and deeply in our bed made of loam.

Roots dig deep, clutching the earth
Creaking downwards, blindly seeking.

And they beg us,
and they beg us.
“Return to the dirt,
return to the dirt.”