The Essence

I found the essence
Of humanity in solitude
Here, amongst the trees
Beneath a midnight sky.
A trace of longing
Would not dissipate
And I knew
The essence of humanity
Is the longing
For you.

Coda

I would run from you, my love
If you would but show me the way
That leads away from you.
No matter how far I travel
Through the dark, forsaken forest
Or the dimly lit cities whose shadows
Penetrate my heart,
The path always leads me back to you.
And death, that most resounding of muses,
Will have to wait
Until my love for you
Dies.

For A Flower-Gatherer

With nothing more than a whisper

My life as it has been passes away and dies

As if carried away by the eastbound wind

Over the black tree-lined horizon

Toward the shores of oblivion.

I watch the icicles drip from the eves,

Each drop like the tic-tock of a clock

Counting down the arrival of Spring.

These snow-covered fields will soon be filled

With wildflowers.

The waters of the brook will be running

Loudly and determined to reach their low lying home.

There will be seeds to plant, crops to reap,

And the sun will shine down ever the brighter

Upon our precious land.

Then, perhaps, the seed that has lain dormant

For so long inside my heart will sprout,

And the flower of my love
Will be yours to cherish once again.

Silence

Wait! But don’t heed the silence.

Become it, encompass it, use it.

Be like the still waters before the rain.

Be like the darkness before the sunrise.

Tame the silence, master it.

Your presence will be immovable,

Impenetrable as the darkness of night.

In that silence you stand alone,

Resonant, more at one with the world
Than any of these ponderous words.

The Meadow

 What is this song that has breached my mind,

That now nurtures my soul with the milk of the divine,

That echoes the passing whims of the years passed by

And washes the long hall of my future clean?

In the nectar of daylight, I breathe deep

The intoxicating presence of your soul.

Such joy as this has no toll.

I’ve come from the shadows of all the past songs I have sung,

To rest naked, in the light, with you, my love.

This song is a blessing, which I pass on to you.

Naked, its flesh now our own, as we lie entwined
In this meadow, watching it rise to the endless blue.

Shadows

We mortals are but shadows

That quake in the light of life,

That ache to rise and solidify

In the purer darkness of night.

And when night falls,

We shadows shall rise

That the stars may shine ever clearer.

Soon to face that from which we were cast,

In darkness we came
And in darkness we shall disappear.

Dialogue Between Two Muses

First Muse

My poet is in love, I know it!

All day long I sing my song,

But he does not hear it!

He is lost in the art

Of weaving romantic intrigues

And forging promises in his heart

That have nothing to do with me!

Oh, I have been replaced, I know it!

No more songs will be sung from those most perfect of lips,

With that most perfect of voices!

All day long he dreams of her,

His tongue neglecting my song,

Rehearsing a kiss!

Oh, the waters of melancholy that once filled his soul

Have begun to drift away towards bliss,

And soon the low and mournful toll

Of the funeral bells that called me home

Will fade, and wedding bells will take their place!

Oh, me! I will fade, fade completely from his mind!

Second Muse

Do not despair, my friend,

For we muses are eternal

And infinite are the wiles with which

We earn our dividends.

Listen close, for I will say it but once.

There is a way to reach your man.

Go not to him, but rather, find the one he loves.

Enter her by dream,

By sight of sky, or gust of wind.

She is the sort who will let you in

Without putting up a fight,

For she has not the calloused mind

Of a well-practiced poet.

Let her be your conduit—enter her, and wait.

He will win her. I know it. I overheard it said by Fate.

And when he does, naturally they will kiss,

And at this moment of unadulterated bliss,

Pass through her mouth and over his lips.

When he looks at her again

From his newfound state of rapture,

Your song will arise in his heart

And reach its former stature.

First Muse

You are very wise indeed, my friend.

Earthly wisdom from a spirit

Is not easily obtained.

How came you upon these wiles?
Have you practiced them before?
For I myself work quite at random,

Like an addict knocking door to door.

Second Muse

I am not really a muse, my friend,

At least not anymore.

Though I show all the signs—

The aura of green, the eyes of fire—

It is no longer my job to give gifts of song to man,

No longer my job to inspire.

I was for many ages a muse, indeed.

But that was before things went sour for me.

You see, I took on poets like Plath and Sexton,

Then later Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, and Janis Joplin.

These poets, for whatever reason (I blame myself)

Took to the art of self-destruction.

It seemed every poet whose voice sang my song

Later fell away from earthly life

As if death had been their calling all along.

So now I stay here, in the Heavens, advising.

For muses I find are most often lacking

In prudence, patience, and often, timing.

First Muse

I am sorry for your misfortune, my friend.

Indeed fortune can be cruel.

I know him well, so I would know.

I too have been fortune’s fool.
But tell me, don’t you feel a longing

To return to your sacred craft?

To make men weep for truth

And for truth turned on its head, laugh?

For we muses are essential, my friend.

Our songs keep men on the righteous path.

Without our gifts, men would slip,

And Hell would rise

Consuming the world in wrath.

Second Muse

I am not in the least tempted, my friend,

To return to what you rightly call a sacred path.

I am perfectly content to remain here in my idleness,

To be amused by other muses

Rather than be a muse myself.

Besides, I’ve found that since I’ve left the craft,

It has all been for the best.

The music has grown sweeter, and the truth

Has coalesced.

First Muse

But I would argue that the opposite is true.

The music of the times lacks the touch of innocence

That made the music of the past more refined.

Perhaps it is your own renunciation

That has caused such a lack.

Return to us, my brother.

Advising muses might be noble,

But advising poets? That is the most noble of tasks!

Surely there must be a song

That you know but do not sing.

Why hold on to beauty?
That is not only heresy, but in fact,

A dangerous thing!

Second Muse

There is a song that I have inside me, it is true,

Which has been stirring for a very long time.

The subtleties of its harmonies, in fact,

Seem so glorious to me that I fear

Should I sing it, every poet in the world would hear,

And then like Babel the world would fall,

And we muses would lose all that we hold dear.

Of course I know that these are idle fantasies,

The dream of every muse that ever sang into a poet’s ear.

But I dare not sing it anyway,

Even into the layman’s ear.

It might drive him mad, I fear

And make him take his life,

A life which matters greatly to many

Whether he sings my song or not.

First Muse

I would ask you to sing this song to me,

But you know that that is against the rules.

We muses are burdened with our own songs.

Your song is not for me to assume.

But why not take a chance?

Why not find a lonely child

Who longs for love and romance,

Who searches for these things in unreachable places,

And cannot express his longing,

Is mute, but whose eyes the truth consorts with?

Fill his mind with your song,

That he might share it with the world.

Then again you might fulfill your duty,

And become one with the Lord.

Second Muse

I have searched the faces and the souls of the mortals.

There is not one who deserves my song.

I will keep it to myself for eternity,

Even after mankind has long gone.

Then perhaps I might sing it

To some lifeless object that remains
To give it life in a world otherwise devoid of life.

But as for man, my song has led him nowhere

But to his grave.

Do not pester me, my friend.

Instead, go to your work.

One song is as important as another,

And yet, sometimes a song must die
In order for existence to be better served.

Her Laughter

When she laughs I hear a thousand sparrows singing

And in her eyes I see a thousand roses springing

From fairy kisses at the first light of dawn.

I hear ocean tides caress the shore of my longing,

And the clapper and bell of my heart collide

To form our nuptial song.

I hear the tenfold odes to joy of ancient poets

Echo in the fathomless hall where ancient kings reside.

I hear the moaning of impassioned lovers,

And their longing, restless sighs.

I hear the stirring of the fire in my heart

Where my own laughter eternally abides.

I hear the fire engulf the forest of my painful memories

And with the sound of my own laughter,
Ah, the smoke does rise.

The Stoker

I want to be the stoker of your fire
And the smoke that rises through your chimney.
I want to be the dream in your dream catcher,
The clapper inside your bell
That announces the call to prayer each morning.
I want my tongue to be the one
That reads the prayer from your open book.
I want to be the beast inside your cage
Pacing and roaring, devouring the flesh you give.
I want to be the minion surrounding
Your sacred ark, be the one who opens
Your curtain, revealing the sacred light.
I want to be the knowledge of your flesh,
The fuel that makes your fire ignite.
I want my rod to be the one that casts your lure
Into an ocean of delight.
I want to be the sun in your day and the moon in your night.
I want to be the earth beneath you,
The heavens above.
I want this song to wrap its wings around us
And squeeze us so tight we have no choice
But to make love.

Odyssey

Your eyes, glazed with ecstasy, promised me oblivion

And with your wine soaked lips,

You bid me taste the lotus blossom 
Growing between your thighs.

I, the lowborn seaman that I was,

Could not deny your siren’s song,

And so I dined on the lotus blossom

Till like a fool drunk I was drawn

To your honeydew breasts

And the crimson wine of your parted lips.

I felt your magic send my mind adrift

Like Odysseus on the last leg of his journey home,

I was lord and master of all the realms,

My sails swelling in the thrusting winds,
My hands steady upon the helm.

Regret

Every notion you do not follow,

Even the ones thrown away

With laughter,

Return later in the form of regret.

Like the dawn,

Biting a wound into the flesh of night

The golden light filches the once-worshipped

Augury of the stars,

The illusion drops

Revealing trees, lamp posts, cars.

You did not follow the stars long enough.

You did not trace your fatalistic path

To a single one.

Now you are exposed by the sun,

That eternal fate you swore against

So long ago.

Your vision, the burden,

Awakening you, in deference, to your life.

Too much to be done—

The stars, not even a memory.

Every breath gilded with an untraceable,

Unquenchable song.

In this vigilant decay of being,

Memory grows

Like a forest whose initial seed

We still search for.

But the cycle does not wait

Even for our breath.

Regret grows out of regret,

Just as our actions proceed

Forever into mystery.

On God and Suicide

In many moments of great despair, I have asked God, as if asking a friend for advice, “God, what should I do?” Almost without exception, I heard a voice say, “Kill yourself.” But always, without exception, I have denied this order. Why? Hadn’t I always been taught that there was a higher power within me? And indeed this voice that I heard might not be without its validity. Perhaps I am a burden to those I am around. Perhaps indeed the world could benefit from my death. But still, I deny this order. I deny it because there is a higher power than that which exists in the deepest crevices of my brain. It is the desire of my body to live, to enjoy pleasure, fulfillment, and love.
            Almost always, in these circumstances, I have had to deny the existence of a God that I so deeply believed in, in order to keep on living. And I also remembered the story of Abraham and Isaac from the Bible. Abraham was commanded to kill his own son, but he was stopped at the last moment by an angel. What is this angel? How does it manifest itself in our lives? Without exception, when I heard the voice of what I believed to be God telling me to kill myself, I went and sought out a friend, an ear that would listen, and understand. These people that are around us are the angels, the true interpreters of God’s voice. Without these people, these angels, how are we to know whether the voice we hear in our minds is God or the devil? We cannot determine this for ourselves. Even the most holy of men must have guidance, they must be checked by those who can see with God’s true eyes the meaning of what they are experiencing, and what is truly possible.

Therefore, if one must deny the existence of God in order to save his own life or the life of another, then I say, all for the better. Those old poets that tell you to listen for a voice are not infallible. Sometimes we must deny the voice. We must live as if living, no matter with great sin or great injustice, was the only thing that truly mattered. To breathe, to feel, that is Godly enough in my opinion. That we must bury ourselves beneath some great divine manifestation that may or may not be a mere manifestation of our own imaginations is simply absurd. We ourselves can be gods. Gods who form our own destinies. Let martyrs be martyrs. Let them die for the great causes. You yourself are a great cause. Live for it! Forget the divine. Learn to love the worldly, the substantial. It is all we know that exists. If you hear a voice that says, “Die,” seek out life. Life is what should be worshiped. Worshipped with every breath.