Green Knight

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GREEN KNIGHT

    

— "A heavy, pressing errand takes me / To a place, somewhere, I don't know where / Or how to find it. But find it I will and / I must."


What the green knight understood 

is that in the glazed gaze of the living dead

life is the ogre that kicks down your door


with the soft thud of its bare feet.

What the green knight knew

is that to find the wildness you’re searching for,

 

that tangled, real stuff that yanks you

from your stale festivities 

with little more than a riddle


and a peace so sharp it could draw blood,

you have to rise from your bench,

walk in the woods with no map


of where you’re going, and

climb into the tomb which turns out

to be a chapel, meeting him there, alone.


It's here you'll confess a secret

or two before acquiescing to lose

your head. Only then will it be given


back to you as if it were a crown,

and you'll walk out of there, at last alive

and bearing a promise to wear the wound. 


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