I was the Gloom

I think that I became a new me yesterday,
gone were dreams once in my head,
found as a husk left beside my bed.

Old walls flashed different colors in my wake,
& no one knew me, acted accordingly,
searching for my former self,
ignoring the unknown thing in their path.

With the sound of galloping hooves beating the loose soil,
my new self draped in Death's pale shroud mounting,
let free upon the world a faint taste on the lips of former life,
chewing the air in my path I raged on, breaking life in my grip,
making of it a city of ugly clay burnt to stone in fiery heaven,
I pulled this all down from the stars, from the saddle,
below the earth I watched alone, under the trampling of fate,
I was the broken sky, the opaqueness of memory, the gloom.

Pride goes

often on a morning just like this today
I find the coffee mug too far away
full knowing when I placed it there
I had assured that this would be the case,

It was still an accident, I am saying, I really want to drink it
before it gets cold, I am saying, but to lean forward, to reach
between table and bed, ah, there's no use, I am saying

the only thing to do is wait until it gets so cold
I am forced to get up and dump it down the sink
then I will fill another cup from the pot steaming goodness
I'll take it back to the bed and after one great gulp
rest it back on the table where it won't be in danger to spill.

among the old there were memories of a leviathan

they whisper, the towering figure on the mound
where he stood, they didn't see it, it was maybe
their mother's mother's grandfather, when the village was founded?
no, the village has always been here, by the mound,
at the foot of the white foam and the sea, they say
that is why we carry the old wood plank up the hill,
they say it is on the anniversary of his coming,
what does the plank mean, where did you find it?
oh it must have been from atop the mound, they say
my grandfather brought it down, but that doesn't seem
right, they say he stood there, and they say he left,
no one saw him go, he was just a spirit and he was gone,
that is why we bring him the gift, they say,
because he was here and then from nowhere he was gone.

Lauryl

*Originally appeared in the Light Ekphrastic*

"Death is acommin in

                                    and mocks my loss of Liberty"

63. The Tree

Cast a shadow over villages

made into the face of the moon,

a tree impervious to seasons, to death,

a pile of limbs, no dent,

in its cradle of branches,

a man, sap marks his blade,

blood, sweat, aching steel,

folded and sharpened by fire,

absurd Wu Gang chopping,

chopping still;

immortality,

an impossible task.

39. Daphne

my fingernails

                        now leaves before the night

for winter

shall

never

wilt

tho earth may dry and crack

my roots

stick

firm

sink deep

                        shall never die

52. Lust/Chastity

a chase

a tragedy

the word once spoken is law

an oath

an apology

46. Genes

Bay Laurel:

of the order Laurales

of the family Lauraceae

of the Genes Laurus

of the species L. nobilis

5. Chastity/Lust

an anachronism

an image

works written for the page

a relic

a wreath

18. Apollo

By her limbs

                        I have wronged

yet I will not learn

but yearn

through an arrow

and in so doing

mourn

tho the earth may pass before my age

I shall

not want

                        shall not be sated

36. The Moon

Madcap, the 64 signs

hear tell of the rabbit,

lives on the moon,

there, he pounds the medicine

of the earth,

in the lunar light,

for the coming age,

the luster, holy water

reflected in

Buddha’s pail;

a body never burns.