grimso tale to outlast fear
by Zev Levinson
Echidius Stumple bumbed outways upon the tilted slate
Nowhere soon did he failfall forsaking song
Severous wolfguards had hid the heart
Echidius subtracking so mislaid the art
Neverwise then Echidius unmade his hearthtracks
A bridge out brought no brides anywoo
Unappled branches allstript thisingularity
Winterways wilewild catapawed himly alonely
Egregial airblest powwers ruptured his daysmood
Underpinup leerily looming verticlitical
Tried licking into rhyme how sun dove groundhalt
Opposonents lining alleyleagues bewilted and diswitted Ech
Solstuck crawdead lamprays cozed murkward
Fomentable memory strongheld such ironwrought bonebars
Alllocked substratal terrainean frametricked
Undoubted nightfall thisis grimso black
Could Echidius Stumple reglare what wasn’t there
Could somany misshapings murder the derelict day
Missundered dancers nowly remembered
Timetorn and turgid chasmsplit the difference
Rerupture now cavernous caverncalling
Ozone dense as furfitual flurry
Distorted Echidius turned sidespent belowall
Eggwishing any shell
inthisex
posed hell
Still the looptwist impulse cryogene tucked hibernial
Slumbers till treadupon to coily tendril saddust earth
And all extraneous sleepseasonseasonseasons
Inert unbludgeoned emberyon ignited onceupon
There fathom far beneath dream
Breath to braille till death do him nail
Echidius if crossified could corrode stainless slate
And all a world forgot to hate
Emergent mawk writhes through terrasquirma
Encounters Echidius asleep
Chewing a corpuscle this carnal larva
Desires the wholicious lumpy sum
But wormteeth undertake only accomplished corpses
Savor senescence and gutspit glowlife
Ech Stum oldlife skinshed
Even buried bit and sampled so felt some remembrane
Swordscribbles lurched his inner canoneye
The maggotsroar had irked his innerear
As the aeonyawn spreadsupon cemetery lawn
Who and what and where he was was gone
Slate stay tilted despite warwon
Home spun paths reversed inherittread
Shadowshift the sun burn away
Goldflake frostdrifting the apple orchard
Echidiustory overreaches victory
Disreguards defeat as heartworthy tales fail safe
Oceanic music inside anywomb gone nilotic
Whilst tavernslake fading burdens
Children bestride pulsation evernigh
Slickening eyebeams betray such wonderfolk
Tender this expedition innocent and scarred
Outlasting fear as Echidius Stumple did
Photo of Zev Levinson
BIO: Zev Levinson is the author of Song of Six Rivers and The Sauntering. He teaches with California Poets in the Schools, has taught at Humboldt State University and College of the Redwoods, is a Redwood Writing Project teacher-consultant, and a founder of the Lost Coast Writers Retreat. See ZevLev.com