Why mourn now for what you lack?
Your bitter will not bring them back;
Your guilty will not bring them back.
Face drawn pale and conscience black
Will not win you what you lack.
Why mourn now for blood you spilled?
Forget each face and name you killed;
Forget the long-lost hope you killed.
Heart with naught but anger filled
Will not catch the blood you spilled.
Why mourn now for those betrayed?
These deaths were choices that you made;
These hands hold choices that you made.
Head that knows it should have stayed
Will still have left those it betrayed.
Why mourn now for what will be?
His eyes are all your eyes can see;
His eyes can something in you see.
Hands that serve him could be free—
But why would such a mercy be?
the light that cleanses also burns!
the torch to wildfire turns
and eats the hand that holds the wood
it is what's pure! it is what's good!
the shadows dim and shadows stark
can shelter none from endless light!
it is what's good! it is what's right!
it is what takes your tongue and throat
for each and every sunny note!
you are on the pyre you made!
look up, you fool! and be afraid!
This is the shape I am when I speak true—
Changing as I am, this stays the same.
This is the shape of my love for you.
In me and of me is something anew
But adding new lines does not alter the frame:
This is the shape I am when I speak true.
And though a new angle may alter the view
The scene is unchanged and unchanged is the name.
This is the shape of my love for you.
And what when I saw it? And what when I knew?
This of the words that I seek not to tame:
This is the shape I am when I speak true.
I'll stand aside as you make your way through:
This is the promise and never the blame.
This is the shape of my love for you.
The falling does not change the fact that I flew.
I leave as the person I was when I came.
This is the shape I am when I speak true.
This is the shape of my love for you.
you hold the torch aloft, i see!
a noble cause! good luck to thee!
the shadows sulk at candle's bay—
the night once more rebuked by day—
a champion, yes, to wield the bright
and send the sunspots off alight!
see the sinners, cast out, wailing!
see your own pure cause prevailing!
see the nightmares, smoked-out, shaking!
see the shining world you're making—
oh! comes the darkness when you flicker
hero of the light, burn quicker!
and now—the sun—more blinding yet
takes up the anger that you whet
and holds the torch to your own feet—
ah, isn't righteousness so sweet?
Blink your stars, thank you, like headlights on a fog
So there may be a reason I freeze.
So there may be shine on me when I cry, I can't, I can't
And the pages run off the printer and away
And clutching my hands find only my own hands.
Thank you, may your peace be long and yours.
I dream of you and dream and sometimes wake
Still curled in years I dropped, trying to put them in my pockets
Into gutters. Because my hands were full.
Because my heart had no hands for itself.
Would I do this again?
I couldn't bring myself to take a step towards repeating
But for you, my heart sings what if
And worth and hope
And my heart sings
Yes, yes, yes.
good people! o listen to all that i say:
i bring on these dark ones a Scour to-day!
send out the shameful! the foul, and the weak!
i bring the rewards for the horrors they seek!
good people! they gave up their rights when they crossed
the line to the shadows! their conscience is lost!
o burn the abuser! o burn all their books!
o hear not a word from these basest of crooks!
good people! to-day is the day of the light!
to-day is the day that we make the world right!
by strength of our face and in this very hour!
the impure will burn in the face of the Scour!
good people! the shadows will never return!
the flames wreathe and flicker—my god— how i burn!
o why do you turn from me looking so dour?
cruel people! i'm dead for the laws of the Scour!
O January, watcher-wise with eyes that shine in darkness
O face that keeps the past, o face that blinks in morning
O twin-in-self that stands in doors with feet on either side
O bright reminder that not every echo is a warning—
O January, if you will, please show some little mercy
I come into this year a deal more burdened than I'd choose
O smile on me face that laughs and not the face that weeps
You who guard our choices must know what it is to lose.
O January, I am here and write my cautious words
There will be singing yet but not for this prayer, not for you
O January, look clear through me with your forward eyes
And tell me that a kinder sun is rising into view.
Hickory dickory
Dance muse Terpsichore
Is of her sisters the
Hardest to say:
People say 'terps-ick-or'
Uneducatedly
For we no longer use
Etas today.
Yes, now the frost is surely done—
The edges of the winter sun—
The bleeding of Hyperion—
The silver-blinding glare below—
The dancing-falling glimmers slow—
And from the ice the water drips—
It sweats against your fingertips—
The dusty snowfall sugar-spun—
The pale bright melting down to none—
Through the grass the rivers run.
The loyal knight was tasked alone
To slay the wyrm of bloody bone
That razed the palace to the earth
And thus, that they might prove their worth,
They left their home with sword in hand.
In their journey 'cross the land,
Though hounded by the dragon's horde,
And having lost the gleaming sword,
They ne'er did falter not despair—
At last they found the dragon's lair.
Once inside, with nary a glance
At its loathsome countenance,
They squared right up and threw a punch,
Slew the fiend, came home for lunch.
Those born in sun have quite the nerve
To see the shadowed, and observe:
How strange it seems to crave the light
Yet learn in dark and live by night!
Always cold are nerves of fire,
Deadened to peace and desire.
This one balm I can have to keep:
I'm not in pain when I'm asleep.
My life, my lie, my sword, my eye,
My tattered voice that here does cry:
Let the fleeting final sigh
For some time more its death defy.
What do gods or mortals know?
There is no world unending.
There is no life that can be lost
From time in all its bending.
There is a time for blood and war,
But far more time for mending,
For slaking thirst and making love
And to one's works attending.
O beneath the sky there's but
The beauty you are lending,
And conversely naught above
But myth wrought fair and rending.
What do gods or mortals know?
Just the ways they're wending,
Just the world they're breathing forth
And chaos' calm upending.
It's dark at four; my mind goes dark as well
And says, "retreat to slumber, rest a spell.
Until there's light, there's nothing we can fix."
It's still dark when I wake again at six.
Summer stays in jars and winter urns,
Fall in cupboards, likewise all that yearns
Close to hand in desk-drawers, all that burns
Set to fly the wind 'til it returns.
Spring is set in boxes, epitaph
Of years long dead carved by a laugh
With poem, script and photograph.
Pages of remembrance. Mostly chaff.
But even so each several-folded note
Brings tears of recognition to your throat,
Each line that once you knew by rote,
Each little mark, each scribbled quote.
Time spreads out and floods the room
With friendship-loss and flower-tomb
Seeds that now can never bloom–
Forget the past and get a broom.
Tired of persistent scars
And pain laced through my nerves
Tired of the old denials
Or what a child deserves
Or did deserve, those years ago
When in such unseen pain
And gone now is the child
But still the scars remain
What's a poem, anyway?
Is it beauty? Is it truth?
Is it how I pray?
It's how I turn my throat from tears;
It's how I speak most plainly;
It's how I see my heart, my lungs;
Is it how I pray?
Long now has the frost held face
And long has in the silent dirt his body lain
Long now is the winter come to last
And long is the last refuge of the slain
Let me be of paper, let me be of rhyme
Let me be of ink and let me have my little time
Let me be of madness that a poem eats like snow
Let me be of peace when it or I must go
Where are all the thoughts displayed
Of those whose minds are yet unmade,
Or who retreated, thus dismayed,
To reticence and retrograde
Or who are altered or afraid?
Where lies what was not conveyed?
Where lies speech by tongue betrayed?
Is that flesh now long decayed
Or does it live to yet persuade?
Has it kept its old crusade,
Its words in finery arrayed,
Its song still leading its parade?
Where lies death we can't evade?
Lost in what's left unsurveyed
By those who hear the serenade
Of flesh, who life like this portrayed:
We are merely minds mislaid
And this is but a sad charade
That leads to nothing. You will fade
And when your final bed is made
Your soul—you've none—will not be weighed.
You will not leave a shard or shade.
It will not matter if you prayed.
This is where we all are laid.
Children of winter are we all
In darker hues, with springtime name.
We are, though we hear flowering call,
Children of winter all the same.
I may be or have been wise
But I can't see behind my eyes
And lack, alas, all clarity
The moment it's applied to me
This I have as all my guide:
That I may try; that I have tried;
That I'm entitled to my pride.
Those alone, and this beside:
That all a body must abide,
Whether dealt with or denied,
Whether whispered, kept, or cried,
In some way must to love subside.
Strange the way the mind will move,
Edges slow across the river,
Doesn't have a thing to prove,
Just has what it will deliver
Just has what it can recall,
What it calls again to light.
Somehow it's fine that is all,
Somehow cold but also bright.
Quick so i can go to sleep again
I do not want to stay awake for long
Words flow tired from my pen
Write me one exhaustion song
Far too fast and much too slow
I find the world. Does someone know
How to catch time's rushing tail—
How to turn the wind and sail?
Last time I made it to November—
Guess the body does remember
Or something does, and pulls me down
Through the words such that I drown
Hard to write new when the old lines ring true
Hard to stay here when the glass is rubbed clear
Can't I sleep sound when the dark is around?
O, can't I sleep tight in the arms of the night?
Here's a song of freedom, righteous one:
You cannot carry peace inside a gun.
The sides are set; the plans are made;
The noble fighters fall, betrayed,
And nothing ever rises but the sun.
Here's a song of freedom, you who lost:
You stand for those your enemy has crossed.
But when your fight has no effect,
You sell what you'd die to protect,
And nothing ever changes but the cost.
Here's a song of freedom, loyal spy:
You talk a pretty game and then you die.
Shout for allies when your cover's blown
But no one comes; you end this life alone,
And nothing ever changes but the cry.
Here's a song of freedom, little king:
You can't escape the ropes from which you swing.
Step out of line and lose your crown;
You're just a pawn to be cast down,
And nothing ever changes but the string.
Here's a song of freedom, villain fell:
You have a choice to make, so make it well.
What's to lose? All you possessed,
Just friends and walls that break when pressed,
And nothing ever changes in this hell.
Here's a song of freedom, reckless heart:
You have been the target from the start.
Leave your hope and take your fear;
You'll never have sure footing here,
And nothing ever changes but your part.
Here's a song of freedom, closest friend:
You bend to save your country, but you bend.
A heart's a liability,
But lock it up and you will see
That nothing ever waits except the end.
This is how I pray, yes.
It has been and it will be,
In the face of the mountain, confronted by sea
There's no god but rhythm to me.
There's no god but poems I write.
I call in my meter, my heart,
This is mine. I will make it mine.
I will move forward but not on.
One for the lost
Two for the seeker
Down in the void
Where minds grow yet bleaker
Trust for a monster
Doubt for a curse
A weapon or answer
For wanting or worse
Fear for a secret
Friendship for guilt
And for those who try
To ease the world's tilt
A hope for the future
A cry for the past
A play for the present
Roles still being cast
No respite for any
With something to ask
No choice without harm done
For this thankless task
No truth and no progress
No respite but doubt
No hand to hold onto
The hand reaching out
This debris gathers
No matter the cost
Where none are forsaken
Nor truly are lost
O the beasts thunder by when the night it is night
And they hunt where the light cannot hallow
For the flag that they fly is a stain on the sky
And the fields that they trample lie fallow
If there is refuge one can find
It lies not in the way one hides
But in the sharing of the place
In which one's truer heart resides
Within the shadows of the mind
Take up the pieces left behind
Rebuild the pathways once upset
To spite those who withheld their grace
And never shall they dare forget
All twisted roots are of a kind
For every fragile bond you make
And every kindness that you choose
An offering of trust extends
To hearts yet marred by such a bruise
And at a yearning touch, they break
Though for a sense of place you ache
Your self abides in what you share
And in so doing, find it mends
What you alone cannot repair
While so too does the home you make
Attend, and thus enlightened be
That those you love you cannot save
Nor can they you, without your trust
Whose hesitation love forgave
In spite of doubt's conserving plea
If past the honeyed lies you see
You may reach stumbling toward the light
Together as you know you must
For what is real and what is right
They say the truth will set you free
And you will find your circle grown
Encompassing all given love
By outstretched or evasive hands
Stained dark with witness from above
And fractured depths of what you've known
As rotting souls who can't atone
Deem all you're ever given just
The cold assurance fear demands
And those you unsuspecting trust
Return you to the fold alone
O creature scared and steadfast, stay
Where living lie and dead things play
And guile grants your coward's heart
No kinder role, no gentler part
As love and duty take their toll
They give this seeking, shattered soul
Whose efforts leave no lasting mark
No home, no refuge save the dark
O god these weary eyes of mine
I fear they see too much
They look on what I cannot have
And was not meant to touch
'Take heart,' they say who gaze at me
With kindness on their tongues
'You're loved,' they say as agony
Sits silent in my lungs
—Loved? I'm loved? I sit alone
And do not sleep at night
I pass through halls like ghosts through walls
And feel as far from sight
How dare I ask my voice be heard?
O, is it not as good
That hate has crawled into my mouth
Just as they think it should
And spoken words I did not speak
To validate their needs
While what I say is no concern
It does not suit their needs
Take heart, take heart! I sit alone
And swallow deep my cry
So no one hears the ragged fears
That from mine own heart fly
O god these weary eyes of mine
See more than they can bear—
I think I was not meant to love
Nor was I meant to care.
What should the ashes of a fire wear?
There is no warmth in numb despair,
A-shiver neath the empty sky;
Don't cry, don't cry, don't cry.
Where should the ashes of a person hide?
There is no home for that which died.
You won't grow up; you won't grow old;
Grow cold, grow cold, grow cold.