A View of the Mountains

Imagine yourself broken on those spires

Like a heretic on the wheel. Hard

Rock, rough trails, sharp

Stones and an unforgiving fall.

Forests lurking with lions, bears, and serpents.

Food is scarce, water poor, and no shelter

From long days under sun or cold harsh storms.

You could die there. Icarus did,

Dropping with sudden weight, wingless

Back to earth, back to rock and dust and root.

And are the green valleys and broad rivers of the land beyond

So much? Perhaps they are only tales,

And Minos rules there, too: mazes, monsters, and mountains

Still taller and more cruel, and the same wine-dark circling sea.

Or you could die in your bed,

A dreamer, waking only to sleep: soft

Pillows, warm blankets, clean sheets,

And the rat you fed your heart.

For Melissa B

Life is short. We are an eyeblink, a light that slips through clouds

From high wide skies to cold hard earth.  A second hand scythes it,

And all that’s left sparks on waves over the silent deep.

But love is long: the sky that holds, the sun that gives,

The clouds that shape, texture, and color. Even the moonless night

Wears countless suns shining through countless skies:

Clouds over swelling seas, seas under rising clouds,

And eyes that open again to the sun on the waves.

Cut From Mercy

And therefore, resigned to my faults,

I’ll cut from mercy its heart, its tongue,

Its eyes – leaving that bitter still

Which so charms my morbid soul to sating.

Let freedom ring! and all my wings a-prison’d,

Caught into the storm – rage as driftwood tossed

By wind and wild. Render unto Nihil

What is Nihil’s: all chance, all time, all bleak

And harrowing horrors made from sun and stars.

This I vow: what is mine is mine alone, and neither

Love nor loss shall touch save what I spare.

No one takes from me but me.

That Jet Beast

That jet beast which struts and slinks from shade to shade,

Sweeps the dark with graceful tail, and stalks

Just outside the window, just outside the light from the window.

Its siren silence, calling  soldiers, sailors,  and crones,

Has caught you too soon.

Your bright self lights a wider sky now, and though ours dims

You were the singular note sparking the song – a new chord resolved.

The void you leave is not empty: it is always you, only you,

And the memory is no less sharp for solace. We hear your place

In the song, the same song, every time.