Coal Dust Flowers


I am not sleeping anymore
last night I dreamt that I was waking in a drift mine
coal dust flowers in the hole I saw mules and I saw engines
and the ventilators stirred
and when I looked I saw your father was beside me
falling in an iron car a thousand miles an hour descending
maybe more

oh canary oh
how your light does shine
you don't know these things I know
as the sun is warm for you as the love he has for you
sinew coal and cord I am not sleeping anymore

the furnace churned and boiled
in a cavity of fractured planks and timbers
the methane turned like gossamer around our blackened faces
and the lanterns lit the shaft
and we whispered in the solace of the coal field
he held his coffee to his lips and said he missed his daughter
even more

oh canary oh
how your light does shine
you don't know these things I know
as the sun is warm for you as the love he has for you
sinew coal and cord I am not sleeping anymore

I am not sleeping anymore
as I closed my eyes I barely breathed to feel him there
dressed without an overcoat and shimmering like ether

oh canary oh
how your light does shine
you don't know these things I know
sinew coal and cord I am not sleeping anymore

I am not sleeping anymore