The amazing medieval learning,
the stones trampled upon I imagine.
The eye cannot escape from the tremendous horrors of the sights,
or maybe I don’t want to let it go.

The ladies wore long dresses made of ash,
or were they only veiled with clouds,
or shrouds.

Illness, hill side, the evil faces all collapse.
Mentors despised minstrels,
the indigent, their iffy ilk

Like matrices they held inside themselves the germs of gems
that would later lead them to hell – like zymosis,
or, as hell never showed up, the flames
the faithful ones would set for them.

Walter Ruhlmann works as an English teacher, edits mgversion2>datura and Beakful, and runs mgv2>publishing. His latest collections are The Loss (Flutter Press), Twelve Times Thirteen (Kind of a Hurricane Press), 2014, and Crossing Puddles (Robocup Press), 2015.
His blogs http://thenightorchid.blogspot.fr and http://nightorchidswork.blogspot.fr