Christopher Hivner

Shy

by Christopher Hivner

I watch you

but don’t say hi.

The note you found

in your mail

was from me,

unsigned I know,

but I meant

every word.

I tried to be poetic

in professing my love,

like Shakespeare

or Neruda,

although those two

never had to work in

“the severed head” or

“your eyelids flutter

when you sleep.”

I have mapped

every step you’ve taken

for the past year

so I always know

where you are

or where you will be.

Someday,

when I get over

my shyness

I will introduce myself

to you

and we can begin.

This Desolation

by Christopher Hivner

My ship has run aground

on an island of shrubs

and rock,

my mate is dead,

and I am starving

on sticks, dirt

and boiled sea water.

The remnants of the Sarah M

sway in the waves,

planks breaking loose

to drift away,

one more piece of me gone.

The beach is covered

in S.O.S messages,

I scan the horizon

as I fish for food to live

but the waters seem to be barren

and the horizon lost.

The paper on which I write

this last statement

was torn from a book

in my trunk

that washed ashore intact.

Apologies to the author

but your words

were of no comfort to me

in my weeks of need

so your pages have become

my epitaph.

Goodbye to the Sarah M,

my home for two years

in my search for

a place to belong.

Perhaps I have found it after all,

here on this desolation

is mayhaps

where I have been destined

all along.

Night Poem

by Christopher Hivner

I can’t see

to write,

attempting an

outside vibe,

but the sun

has gone down,

now I sit

in the dark

with an electric poem

wallowing in my head,

my handwriting in the notebook

disjointed lines

forming not so much words

as hieroglyphics

with no translation.

Go inside, you say,

but the atmosphere

is different there,

artificial light,

separate smells,

no noises of nature,

only the groan

of ancient water pipes

and the slither

of ghosts in the walls.

If I walk away

from my outside mojo

it may not follow me

past the force field

of the door frame.

The poem could be lost

and what if it’s the one,

the lines I’ve been

trying to write

for thirty years?

What if it

could unlock being me

or explain

why people leave?

What if it’s funny

and makes readers laugh?

What if it’s the last poem

I ever write,

one final idea

that solves everything?

My ruminations

have distracted me

while the poem

made its escape,

walking right out of my head

past my pen.

I was a fool

to think I could

capture a night poem

in the light

and now I have to pay

the starry muse

with blank paper.

Plate Tectonics

by Christopher Hivner

The shift was soft

at first,

the movement underfoot

sent small shudders

beneath my skin.

The quiet from her space

registered as

a temporary misfire

after years of test work.

I walked room to room

not seeing the cracks

in the foundation,

not feeling the pressure building.

Time became unbearable,

words were eaten

and swallowed

with a dry mouth,

silence tethered us

with wire

pierced through our lips,

drops of blood

running along the metal brace

to meet in the middle

and fall to the floor.

The rupture that knocked me down

came when she spoke

so matter-of-factly.

As our chain snapped back in my face,

dead words

dropped from her mouth.

I fell

into an open crevasse,

her voice

chasing along behind.

Plumes of ash

sprouted into the air

obscuring her face,

rumbling like a derailed train

closed around me

but when she spoke again

the words still got through.

We settled

as the sun went down,

me here,

she out in the fog.

I scavenged in the rubble

for a list of days,

finding solace

in my position

as King of empty space

where the doors stay shut

to hide my body,

wrapped in bloody wire,

her words

still singing

in the vibrations.

*****

Seeking

by Christopher Hivner

I walked through

the fire

to reach you,

the flames still

flaring on my skin

as we touched,

but instead of putting

me out

you poured gasoline

over my body

and threw a lighter

at my feet.

My gait through

the conflagration

has slowed

but I’m on my way

following your

trail of sulfur.

Time to Fall

by Christopher Hivner

There is a sadness

that speaks our names,

calls to us

in an ethereal whisper

when the worst

has happened,

when the glass walls

we erected

for protection

while dealing with the world

have split into shards

on the ground.

When we are bared naked

to the teeth,

of everything we fear,

that is the moment

of despair

that calls up

from the well bottom,

the grief-pain

whose voice is our own

sings to us

that the thread

we were holding onto

has rotted

and it is time

to fall.

It is the sadness

that speaks our name

because it has known us

all our lives.

*****

Among the Living

by Christopher Hivner

I saw the line

and followed,

light from the universal glow,

a guide

to let me see

all that I have buried,

an ancient map

of oceans and sea monsters

created by the layers.

I navigated myself

with no instruments,

nodding to the stars,

the light a halo

protecting the secrets

I can’t tell,

divining the dust

that created me.

This search

for my place

pounds inside like a timpano,

pushing pulling dragging suspending flinging tempting lifting,

the stars can only guide,

I must follow,

I must decide

where X marks the spot,

where the journey ends.

The land beneath me rises,

an island

among the spotless waves.

Infection

by Christopher Hivner

The tiny man

inside my head

knows the truth,

speaks it into my brain

in short sentences

with abrasive vehemence.

I don’t disagree

with him,

I know he’s right,

the evidence is everywhere.

As I drive down the street

he points out

the infections crawling

among us,

next to me

at the grocery store,

handling my food

at the restaurant,

screaming in my ear

that I’m next.

The tiny man’s voice

is raucous in my head,

can’t sleep,

haven’t bathed

in weeks,

the infections

are fighting to get

inside of me,

under my skin,

in my blood.

My vision is fading,

and all I can hear

is my friend’s voice.

Sitting at my bedroom window

peeking around the closed curtains,

it’s three a.m.,

no sleep since Tuesday

and today is . . .

another day, maybe Thursday,

maybe not.

The infections are outside

in the air,

in my trees,

on my house,

I don’t want them

to get inside of me,

I bought a gun

to protect myself.

I broke my bedroom window

and started firing wildly

at every infection I saw,

the things

were hissing at me

until I shot them

in their insectile faces,

stopping the chitter chatter

of their filthy mouths.

The tiny man

in my head

said I did well

and eased my fear.

I reloaded

and waited.

When the police

removed me from my home,

I pleaded with them

to talk to the tiny man,

but they wouldn’t listen.

Outside there was blood on my grass

and sidewalk,

the neighbors watched

and I recoiled

at the infections

oozing from

their noses and ears.

When they opened their mouths

to whisper to one another,

more slithered out.

“Shoot them! Shoot them!”

I screamed,

but the police told me to shut up

and dragged me to their car.

The tiny man

in my head

was suddenly silent

when I needed

him most.

The infections

crawled up my pant leg

and inside my shirt.

I closed my mouth

to keep them out

with no way

to cover my nose and ears,

I was being invaded

and no one

did anything to help.

I cried out,

lunging at one of the cops

to bellow in his face,

“Don’t let them in me!”

and then my tiny man returned

instructing me

to bite the cop’s cheek.

The blood filled my mouth,

his beard rough

against my tongue.

Right before I was

cracked in the skull

with a nightstick,

I heard the tiny man

cackle with laughter

before his voice

disappeared forever.

*****

Christopher Hivner writes from a small town in Pennsylvania surrounded by books and the echoes of music. He has recently been published in Monomyth and Weird Reader. Facebook: Christopher Hivner - Author, Twitter: @Your_screams