Song of Boundless Time

Talking of the night has become a sin.

Myriad legends roam within.

The night is weary of my song.
I have spoken of it for so long

That its silence springs its will like a lion

Upon my heart and devours it.

So, I coalesce into myself.

After all, I know of nothing else.

Death now seeks me from every corner,

But I do not fear the blow of his scythe.

The wheatgrass of my soul has grown long

And golden. Then let him strike.

The crickets are alluring and the wind

Wants a home. I give the wind my words

And it keeps going, compelled to roam.

Heavy now are the words that come.

So I lay them down. 

I sing now of the world and how it left me.

Great are the depths from which these shadows

Romance their way into my eyes.

The moon awaits, bright, in the sky.
God wills me to die.

Wake the eye. Speak easy of the eye.

Sing easy—the night is broken into hours.

Sing easy—lest by the song you are devoured.

Time, boundless time, shapeless time, virgin world

Of time’s beginning, what have you to offer?

This inexpressible urgent prayer I give to time

To master with its perfect pendulum, its endless

Paean of creation. Wave upon wave of time

Carrying the offal of existence upon the shores

Of chaos and putrefaction. Immutable time,

That owns the frontier of tomorrow and tomorrow

And all the yesteryears.

The crickets are alluring and the wind

Wants a home. I give it this home, the song

Of tomorrow, a song of suffering unbeknownst
To God, and He shall never know, for the song

Belongs to time, and time

Suffers nothing of the Lord.

Exiled prince of the shadow, come

Converse with me! A wageless war

Is being waged upon the sea of time.

A vanguard symphony is being played

Beneath the poplar trees in the key of time,

And will be played for eternity!

The wind comes and moves through the trees

Seeking sustenance, a song of eternity.

I give my song to the wind, which forevermore

Sings its epiphany of time, boundless time,

Echo-less time, shapeless time, virgin world

Of time’s beginning, what have you to offer?

Home, the boundless frontier of life,

And the eternal resting place of my song’s sepulcher.

God

You whisper madness

Into her ear

And she becomes

Light comprehending darkness

Always brighter for the madness

always dictating the universe

With her laughter. She kneels at the altar

And prays to a god that aligns her spirit

That proliferates her love Who is he

The clever one to say her prayers

Are foolish? Clever/foolish

Two sides of the same coin

In the middle is God

So the wise man would say       Even the foolish one

Even the clever one.

Sunset

Evening is upon me.

The sunlit sky

is milky

and 

multicolored

bespangled 

like

an Indian princess

descending a flight of stairs.

She has kissed the world

and leaves

blushing

into the west.

The world

is left

in a pall of shadow

and we feel 

the sadness of her leaving

the stars remaining

as reminders

of her return.

Circuit

She lay 

naked

on the cold stone floor

her perfect body

eloquent

as a sea of honey

and when the electricity

of her flesh

reached my own

such a surge as would black out the sun

flowed through me

and sweet connectivity

saved us both

from burning

as we both lay naked

on the cold stone floor

one electrical current

running in a circuit

between us.

Survival

The music of innocence 

Hushed and turned to silence

And out of sheer terror, 

I screamed.

I launched campaigns

Of hatred and rage

Against everyone who loved me.

Everything was an affront

To all that was sacred—

Which was nothing, or nothingness.

I couldn’t see or feel or touch

Without it being a mortal sin.

It seemed the only act of grace 

I could commit

Was committing suicide.

I declared existence 

To be nothing more 

Than a lie.

But I was kept alive

And if not shown the truth,

I was shown enough of it

To survive.

Trip Through the Snow

 

Steve Boscherman set out from his group home on a cold, snow-covered day in January. It was still snowing lightly, and had snowed hard from last night up till very recently. Steve lived on a backstreet, and the streets surrounding him were still unplowed. He was going to the grocery store to pick up ingredients for the dinner he’d be preparing for his housemates. Melissa, the house manager, had insisted that he go, despite his complaints that it was too cold, and that the snow was too deep. Steve had been insubordinate more than a few times as of late—flaky with rules and defiant toward leadership—and Melissa was adamant. Either Steve go to pick up the ingredients and prepare the nightly dinner, or he would face serious consequences.

As soon as Steve exited the house and was standing on the front porch, he felt the sting of the extreme cold on his face, and grumbled to himself. He pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from the pocket of his old, torn, blue bubble coat, and managed to pull out a cigarette, and put it to his lips. But his thick gloves prevented him from lighting it. Cursing to himself, he removed one glove, and lit the cigarette with his free hand and sucked on it, hard. Putting his glove back on felt like a great relief, even after it was only off for a moment. The cigarette still resting between his lips, he grabbed hold of the snow-covered railing with both hands, and, taking one step at a time, went down the stairs sideways, as slow as he could manage, straining his face against the cold wind and hoping that Melissa was watching him from inside. The snow was wet and compact, and so deep that the stairs couldn’t be seen. Every step felt treacherous.

Once down the steps, Steve turned left in the direction of the grocery store. He removed the cigarette from between his lips—his eyes were watering from the smoke—and trudged off through the deep snow, which sank beneath his steps with a crunch, and with every step it was as if he had to climb out of a hole. Already, his breathing was strained. In fact, he was wheezing by the time he got to the first corner. He considered the idea of turning back, but now that he had left the house and made it this far, his spite toward Melissa was transferred to the elements, and he felt hell-bent on overcoming them, as if it were the elements themselves which had insulted him, and not Melissa.

“One block down,” he said to himself as he crossed the street toward the block where a church was situated. Once across the street, he stopped and took two or three puffs on his cigarette, then started walking again. At one point, the snow was higher than it had been before, and as he stepped into it, he sunk so deep that he had to crawl his way forward, which caused him to drop his cigarette. Getting out of the hole and wiping the snow off his jacket, he looked for the cigarette, and found it, but it had burned out. “Damn!” he cried. He reached into his jacket and pulled out the box of cigarettes and the lighter. This time, he knew to take off one glove before attempting to light one up. Having done so, and taking a couple of deep inhalations, he continued off again.

He made it another block. “That’s two,” he said, interrupting his heavy wheezing, which seemed to come from deep down in the very core of his body. 

The store was another three blocks. By the time he was nearly there, he had to sit down. He found the back of a bench peeking out of the deep snow, and sat against it, even though the bench’s seat was completely buried. He sat for a moment on the sloping pile of snow, feeling the sting of his lungs become more and more pronounced. He reached into his pocket, and lit up another cigarette. 

Having finished the cigarette, it was time to enter the store. There was almost no one inside. He went around, walking gingerly so as not to slip with his wet boots on the slick floor, picked up several packages of ground beef to make hamburgers with, a large package of frozen French fries, and paid for the food at the checkout stand with the money that Melissa had given him. The food was bagged and Steve set out to return home.

After trudging back for several blocks, while reaching into his pocket to pull out another cigarette, Steve discovered that the change for the food—about fifteen dollars in total—was missing. If there was one thing that Steve prided himself about, it was his care for other people’s money. He looked behind him, squinting, and tried to locate the money. He didn’t see it. Cursing, he turned around. Just then, the wind and the snowfall picked up. Cursing his luck, he trekked back a block, wheezing and smoking, and there, in the parking lot near the store and nearly buried in the new snow, was the fifteen dollars he’d lost. He trudged over and, sensing that he was in for a struggle, bent down…

His belly was so huge, however, and the wind was so cold and stiff, that it was difficult. His first attempt was a failure, and he stood up, gasping for air. He tried again—another failure. Finally, feeling as if he were about to pass out, he fell onto the snow with his rear-end. Something was happening to Steve—something which, many times in his past, people had warned him would happen. There was an intense pain in his chest, and he found that he was unable to breathe. Suddenly, he remembered his childhood. He saw his younger brother when he was just a boy, sandy-haired and vibrant-looking. His brother had looked up to him, and followed him everywhere. How long had it been since he had seen his brother? Five years? Again, a sharp pain hit Steve in the chest, and he lay back and rolled onto his side, cringing. He tried to find his phone in his pant pocket. His hand searched the pocket desperately. Again, the pain. He managed to take the phone out of his pocket and started to scroll through the contacts. He saw his brother’s name, and pressed dial.

On the other line, a man was saying, “Hello? Steve? Hello?” But he received no answer. Steve lay with his head in the snow. The bag of groceries lay beside him.