Riverbed 4

The moon is blue tonight, the wind is freezing The river is restless and I have stopped breathing An upside down swordfish pierced my parachute, fireflies Flicker and it makes you want to hide your eyes I breathe out gently right before my own death Exhaling the mist of a three quarter tone breath Like a pyramid of heartbeats, everything fainting Like the windless delicacy of the air in Chinese paintings I inhale the ashes of past deaths and dust From butterflies wings and particles of rust My eyes become gemstones, forgetting the fears For glittering merely, not the shedding of tears Sleep recites the psalm of the damned No need to watch the flame of my life in the palm of my hand As pale as the holy ghost speaking many languages No one knows the secret, no enemy vanquishes The dream will watch over it, as I lie broken No need to remain with eyes wide open The pulp of roots and mile of cactus eases my pains The quick silver drippings of the trees in my veins A matress of moss, candles in my branches Carried by the wind, buried by avalanches Everything proceeds in slow motion under here No wonder this is the sleep of one hundred years