The glow of coals keeps away the dark.
At its ruddy edge, a tired man lies
against a log with eyes like embers
watching flecks of red spark the sky.
He’s breathing heavy with a hand
pressed against the pulse felt in his side.
He thinks about the other side,
the one that comes after dark,
and the blood rusted on his hand
that solidifies the mark that he lies
broken under heaven’s sky.
He thinks about the embers.
They’re getting low, the embers,
but the man has nothing by his side,
save dirt and grit– sandy like the night sky
whose stars sift his fire into dark,
draining his thoughts of truth and lies
as ground cascades from his hand.
He grips what remains in his hand,
tight, as if to toss into the embers,
but stops and sighs, and now it lies
on his chest like gunpowder, offering his side
of this moment in the dark,
to be sparked by angelfire in the sky.
Everything seems too large, the stars and the sky.
To speak would have silence reply; a hard hand
penned with shadows in the dark
as if a wet bark laid atop the embers
and swapped sparks with smoke inside
his mind. It will lead me or bury me, he lies
to himself, because he doesn’t know what lies
behind his eyes in black like the night sky.
He doesn’t feel the hot wetness on his side.
There is a stiffness in his hand.
Ash and moonlight have buried the embers
and stars look like sand in the dark.
The tired man lies hand over hand,
his eyes heavy on the sky while the embers
crack their last lament and side with the coming dark.
Colton Jackson is an Arkansan exploring the Pineywoods of East Texas.
He holds a B.S. and M.A. from Arkansas State University, and an M.F.A. from the University of Arkansas at Monticello. He is
currently a Professor of English at Tyler Junior College.