Leave Taking : Vermont

Yes, I would rather remain here
But I cannot

Skulking under your towers
Imitating your habits

Your virtues and vices
Gathered from the rack

At the second hand store of
Someone else's ideas

A Hindu Sage, some new age prophet
A man with a farm, or a wind turbine

I'd like to remain here
But I cannot

Because it isn't for me
Finding new sexual partners at contra dances

Chattering over the Law of Attraction
Meditating, eating wholesome food

Dreaming, dreaming again as the seasons
Continue their clockwork four-part rotation

I can't stay, while you tune your Subaru
Or address your emotional trauma

Sure - I respect it. I really do.
And it's all very good, stuff.

But I'll tell you something :

This whirlpool dream, this sleepwalking.

Is rejecting me, casting me from its lotus-eating
Mutual spell of agreement.

Out, in, out, in, to where answers
Are dug from ground like slender roots

Coveted like nourishment in a famine, in a siege

Cast out from this land of dream pleasures, of polished smiles
Nodding heads, and the sweet, so sweet
Yet ostensibly merciful execution of vinegar drinkers

Out into total darkness,
Outside the radius of the dancers, their stamping feet

Out, out, outside the secure walls
Where I long to be, rubbing flesh with the crowd
Until pale death carts me away

I would like to stay here in your green hills

I wish to remain with you

But something I don't understand

Is calling me away