It’s the
mind that is first to go:
As
thoughts wander, the flesh follows,
The
ticking clock’s worn rhythms slow,
A shell
remains, the rest hollows,
Horizons
fade in swirls of dust,
Futures
recede, prospects barren,
Age sits
down hard like barnyard rust,
Little to
hold, nor to share in.
What
tipping point the decision
To leave
such life and go hither,
That one’s
spirit seeks revision
And deep
roots begin to whither?
When sown
seeds no longer matter;
No food on
this Kansas platter.
Mark Flotow
KANSAS DIVERSION
I post
this note for whomever’s concerned:
"I
lie buried back in my Union state,
For which
I fought, wounded and then returned,
Minus part
of a hand, my cruel war fate.
Chickamauga
old dreams haunted me still,
Of
contorted comrades, which stole my rest
At the
neglected farm I tried to till,
And left
that plot for this place far out West.
A
soldier’s thoughts were part of my baggage.
A Kansas
decade passed here in my bed
With old
visions from my mental ravage:
Thus I had
stopped living and so instead
Was dying
right after the Civil War;
My bones
now are East on a grave-shaft floor."
Mark
Flotow