And in this
lonely, dusty ruin
I count the coins
comprising
the price
of my perdition.
I have strangled
my conscience,
and opened
my accounts.
An easy life
in uneasy trade
for a diseased soul
that screams
and cries
in the silence.
I watch it
fall away.
I will be
troubled no more
as it sleeps.
And see
the teardrops
spray from my lips
as I whistle
and smile,
eternally
dying.
What is it that keeps
your heart in chains
of darkness, graves,
voids, abysses,
and things
that cut and kill and burn?
Do not your
sleep-filled eyes
behold the sun?
the clouds?
the stars?
What calls your mind
to embrace
the gibbering shadows
that dance in
ever-tightening circles,
venturing up
to block your view of heaven,
laying waste to your
body and mind?
Yet in you
is the seed of song,
of love,
creativity.
Work the fire.
Forge the axe
that sunders darkness
with light
and sets you free.
Prey,
tell us you
are game.
I pour the blood
from my heart
This ink
This lead
These pixels
Resurrected in
the empty church
of my life
Briefly seen,
my life imagined
as I once saw it
Fleeting
the feelings
of my flesh,
the senses of
my being
I kneel
in the empty, fragrant
darkness
The small wooden window
that leads to where I toss my sins
like wedding rice
never opens
I say them
all the same
They pile
like decaying petals
at my feet
multi-hued
multi-faceted
radiant with putrescence
They smell of illicit love
drunken torture
anger and loneliness
rage and despair
I press them to my heart
to stop the bleeding
absolving myself
resolving never to do
these things again
And so the risen sun
forgives me
But I have chosen death.
You hold the knife
as one holds
a fallen fledgling,
Your eyes command my approach,
and as I shuffle,
the shackles sing a
discordant, jangling dirge
I weep,
but whether for my soul
or for your cruelty,
I cannot say.
I held you.
Kissed you.
Loved you.
Sang you to sleep in my arms.
Your smile transfixed me,
and the hidden coils of your flesh
felt warm in my hands.
Your lying mouth
wrought cries from the core of me.
And like fresh clay
you molded me into a sacrifice,
Sharpened your knife
on your heart of stone.
Pray make it quick, love.
I will wait for you
in the
frozen abyss…
The beacon skims
the waves
but no ships sail
this hour of night
A false dawn lights
the horizon, and
obsidian skies blush pale
as the stars shine
their last
My small lantern
battles
what shadows it can tame.
The rest wait their turn
The mulled wine
warms the bones
and softens the edges
of harsh memories
My breathing,
the scratch of the pen,
the sizzling pop of an oil bubble
sound all the louder
at this hour
Far below,
waves whisper
susurrations
of sighs
The keepers of
the past
watch from
realms unseen,
but whether in
approval or censure,
I can’t tell.
Either way,
I’m undone.
A red gold band
of light
sears the seam of
the horizon
I finish the wine.
I finish the page,
and close my eyes
to the sweet brightness
And once more
the walls crumble
to ruin,
the light
dies,
and I fade
like the names
of lovers
drawn in the sand
before high tide.
I write
in the
shadowed places
cold, bleak
and dark
Stepping on cracks in the sidewalk
full of cigarette butts,
phlegmatic spit
and on occasion,
blood
There are crevices
in the fences too,
where the wind whistles
off key,
enticing me
to emerge
and share.
And I want to,
I so very want to,
and know that I
so very
never will
The silent shadows
comfort me,
drape their darkness
across my shoulders
like the powerful arm
of a strong friend
I shift and settle,
a bag of garbage
kicked in the corner,
under a wedge of dim, flickering light
from a faulty streetlamp,
the wires humming in
off key harmony
with the whistling wind
Come out to play, poet…
‘No,’ I reply to the invitation,
now no longer content to be in
the shadows.
I melt into them.
My words spin
out and away,
beyond my control,
into the vast, black
void of heaven.
And I write
in the
shadowed places
I found it quite by accident,
long after
you were gone.
A sunbeam
through the dirty window
was resting on it,
a celestial beacon
like
a navigator’s star,
or a savior’s herald.
Emotions stirred,
slow and sluggish,
a snail waking from sleep.
I hesitated, standing in
the acrid, arid attic dust,
my heart warring
with my mind,
Do I open
the treasure of us?
Long buried memories
of times past,
of youth and strength,
of love and passion,
of you smiling,
of us, in love.
I could open
the creaky wooden lid,
softened, like me,
by age.
I could grasp
the rich fabric to my cheek,
and twirl the bright coins in my fingers,
admiring their sparkle and flash
in the fading light.
I could let slip
through my fingers
the bloody cloth and the fool’s gold.
But it’s all of a piece, isn’t it?
And I would have
peace now.
I wiped my tears,
and left
the treasure of us
unopened.
I will hold it
in my heart,
in these last days.
For that is enough,
and somehow
more than riches.
As autumn dies,
the bitter night wind
seeps into the stone walls
of what has become my
new home.
Hope of leaving
abandoned me.
She peers into the defeat
replete within my gaze,
and smiles
with
pleased and mocking scorn.
Dressed in midnight,
she comes,
a cream-skinned shadow
in silvered fog,
and tells me her name
is
Cara,
as if I cared,
as if defeat had somehow
changed to affection.
A Murder follows her,
and obeys her every gesture.
Her lacquered black nails point,
and soft eyes are
plucked like jewels from bone settings,
the screams
drowned by the eldritch music
of their raucous cries.
Why do you stay? she whispers in my mind.
Do you not see there are no stones to bar your path?
No chains, no locks, no guards to block your way?
Blind,
I stumble past
the warring scents
of lavender and carrion,
to roam
the shrouded night.
Exhausted,
helpless,
and alone,
by dawn
I find myself
returning
once again,
to where she freed me.
And barefoot, shivering,
crying ice-laced tears,
I walk the frigid riverbed
back to my
Cara-cell.
This pale raven,
prepared to shine,
this ivory plumage
s p a n n e d
beneath
the cobalt sky.
Alabaster wings
scatter stars,
red-gold talons
grip tight
the silver moon.
In silent flight
rising
above the
shadowed world,
breaking chains
of spirits,
herald of the
mist,
and emissary
of a
sunless realm,
nevermore
to shine.
Vanquished now,
I return
to find
all bare of life,
and stilted, stifled purpose
laces the air that has
disguised her
earthy scent,
rank loam in the ruins.
The stones of my home,
my fence,
tumbling
atop each other,
as my men
from their horses,
ungainly unseated,
and skewered
for their lack of skill,
or a champion.
Grasping, bare, black branches soon
reach to pull me into
the shadows
of my mind.
As did she.
Merciful
was the
headsman’s ax,
and swift.
The sky and ground
joined hands
to somersault
in sun-dappled motley
before my eyes.
And
I returned home,
now
Vanquished.
Beyond Panic 