1925
doomed: a word like the toll of a bell, beckoning
towards death. blue marl clay shrink-swell soil
in their mouths, under nails, clod-handfuls in fists
which push whitely toward the air. men emerge
like grubs, pale and stained, the skin of one hanging
cloak-like from his body. later, his burns will
drag him under the surface, back to wet walls
in perpetual collapse, a hell of rumor and blood.
the tunnel become a grave, long, narrow. here,
beneath my feet, they dug for the railroad, moneyed
hubris putting aside unstable earth until a cave-in
forced their hand. resurrected by urban legend,
a vampire stalks these fanning hills:
deep evil brought to life by witnesses who watched
the burned man escape. just like us,
to see one in pain and to name him monster.
chewed up by the shining teeth of commerce,
he haunts our memories, spawns an echo which darts
from tunnel to graveyard faster than human feet can flee.
at night, I visit the mouth, walled off with concrete,
place pennies like obols where the entry once
yawned. it does little good. they are gone,
swallowed up by soil and greed,
half-forgotten almost a century later
as the copper clinks against cold stone.
Michaela Mayer is a 27-year-old poet and educator from Virginia. Her first chapbook is out with Fahmidan Journal, she has a beautiful cat named Sappho, and can be found on Twitter @mswannmayer5.
