"Last Years of a Carousel Horse" by John Grey

Last Years of a Carousel Horse

You can’t bury wood
with appropriate ceremony.
Instead, you lay him on his side,
head stretched,
knees bent, hoofs raised
as if in gallop,
but his mane cracked,
tail worm-riddled,
brisket broken.

One ear is pressed to the earth.
The other listens
to your fractured singing,
that sibilant, weathered
and failed calliope.

His paint will peel,
weeds and grass
sprout through clefts
in his hips and shoulders.
It’s always a slow death
for things already dead.

John grey

John Grey is an Australian poet and US resident, recently published in Stand, Santa Fe Literary Review, and Sheepshead Review. Latest books are Between Two Fires, Covert, and Memory Outside the Head, available through Amazon. Work upcoming in the McNeese Review, La Presa, and California Quarterly.

Headshot: Gale Grey

Photo Credit: Staff