Make Believe
Our only cover is time
and the thin air of winter.
Become addicted to something
especially the idea
of who you are.
This is necessary make believe.
Do we know the rose is a rose?
That the frost on its hip
is the ash of burning angels?
Unlikely, is the answer
that quietly avoids our loss.
Our only cover is time
and from the garden we never left.
We only paint our eyes
with the blood of our birth
and wrap our faces in cellophane.
Matthew D. Allen, originally from Brookings, Oregon, now lives in Portland where he spends much of his time working with and climbing city trees. Find more of his work at zigward.com