There is a shadow
over the world these days.
Maybe it's been there for a while,
it just took time to notice.

The flinching gazes of friends
nervous like grazing deer
in the open. Exposed,
like fraguile things
no longer confident.
Humanity seem to realize
how young we are.

The guns are loaded.

The blood is real

3
2
1

We are not ready.

And here it comes.

The little angel sits in silence
drops pebbles into the well.
Contemplating what state now
will befall both Heaven and Hell.

Little angel toes touch gently
water fresh and freezing
as a gentle southern breeze
brush her neck, kind and pleasing

The war is raging, she knows
a moment she knew would come.
She blesses in peace her sanctuary
where she can be alone.

Far away, the noise of battle
where fiends of carnage dwell.
Five jagged arrows she pulls from her body
then drops into the well.

Silent strings are stronger still
than many, strong with each other.
True to itself, if true at all
or but the echo of a mother:

An echo, an echo but higher.
An echo, not embers but fire.
A thunderstorm in June at sea
to petrify and admire.

Single strings sing higher pitches
undestracted and unaccompanied.
Shining their own sun sincerely,
unfettered, let loose and freed:

Alone, alone but living.
Alone, unheard but singing.
A hidden diamond in the dirt;
competing not but winning.

There is a voice of comfort,
a poet of the truth
chords interwoven in every crack,
to lighten and to sooth.
Silken syllables singing
like distant thunders' clouds
to the lonely, humble ones
whose candles soon burn out.

A blessing from a being,
bestowed between the bad
who sat upon his whispered throne;
beaten, black and ironclad.
The boon from a saint of satin tongue
to those humanity fit;
humble thinkers, meek and strong
of kindest hearts and fathers' wit.

There is a voice of comfort,
for all who soon pass on.
When the darkness closes in
to where you thought you belonged.
It will pass you on with dignity,
mirror mentors of the Minoan
"Hineini, Hineini. Here I am,"
sings the ghost of Leonard Cohen

After the battle
Flaming fragments fall like snow
Like glowflakes

They sought me at night when Sirius rose
like a prince on his canine steed.
Tugging my sleeve they led me outside
like a child in parental need.
Out in the garden, the grass wet with dew
still warm beneath my feet.
They pointed at the Moon and whispered:
"He thinks it's time you meet"

The Moon turned away from the sunset and mused
at little barefoot me:
Pyjamas on with stars and suns
rubbing my eyes to see.
"You've caught my eye trough the window at night
gazing at me and my stars.
No one  else knows it yet, for you are too young,
but I know who you are"

The fairies let go of my sleeve and fled,
knowing their work was done.
The Lake of Tranquility suggested a smile
upon the face of the Moon.
"Son, let me tell you, I know it seems strange
but your life is about to begin.
A life down there on little Tellus,
with a universe to win.

"I will lend you an astral helping hand
on your road so winding and long
I'll give you fascination keen and searching
and a clever mind so strong.
For a life of difficult struggles is yours,
of endless rights and wrongs,
of painful challenges unknown to most,
yet of secrets, dreams and songs

"Why must my life contain all this pain,
why can't I just dance and sing?"
The Moon let go of it's tranquil smile
"There'll be little singing and dancing.
But you will stand in the Light of Knowledge
as undisputed king.
So be brave and clever and always remember:
You're a king, -a King, little Stephen Hawking.

Hoppy demon, happy wizard
Turning men into mice.
Rendering even the humblest man
a hero in disguise.

You asked for a life
Full of beauty and music
The devil said no

There is a village in a land far away
where nobody talks and all words are saved
for books and for scrolls and lovers' sweet letters.
They all agree silently: this way is better.

Oh yes, they have music, -the wonderful kind!
That spreads like a fire from mind to mind
And poetry written but never read out
For the words within are stronger than without.

And love's in silence and beautifully true,
Lips need no movement to say 'I adore you'.
Voices are never to disturb or to pester
For in the Land of the Mute, the talking man is jester.

Eyes do the talking, and truthfully so
as lies are not possible so close to a soul.
There is a village in a land far away,
if I ever go there, there's a chance I'll stay.

I refuse to die
Before my eyes have witnessed
A butterfly's birth

"We are an unimportant restlessness of dirt, and yet (Dante Gabriel) Rosetti paints his dead wife Elizabeth, head tilted back on her impossibly slim throat, eyes closed against the golden light surrounding her. Clay looks on clay and understands that it is beautiful. Through us the Cosmos gazes on itself, adores itself, breaks its own heart. Through us matter stares slack-jawed at its own star-dusted countenance and knows incrediously that it knows and knows that it is Universe."

Between the rocks beneath a mountain
the calmest dark upon her chest
where eyes don't stare or fingers grasp
the sleeping queen, she rests.

"Oh, to be found in the shadows
by a prince of unknown grace.
To be taken to his castle
with the sun upon my face.

"Perhaps a farmer or a youth
then cleaned by ***** hands
and brought as a gift of wonder and awe
to a love in humbler lands.

"Perhaps an artist, -a troubled one
whose craft is life and duty.
Whose heart is filled with heavy burdens
and art is filled with beauty".

Tectonic plates, they rumble
she gives a lazy yawn
as a glimpse of light now reaches in
to reveal the naked dawn.

And with the dawn an arm extends
to lift her from her bed.
The bony fingers carry gently
the queen that never wed.

"Perhaps an unlucky homeless man
whose clothes are rags and tatters.
Whose sole possession is me, a diamond,
and I'll be all that matter".

In a village in the deepest jungle
a travler finds a treasure
in the hand of a homeless man
beyond all Earthly meassure.

He says: "Do you know what that rock is worth?"
The homeless says: "I can't,
I lost my sight in the war, you see
but she feels good in my hand".

And he worshipped her all his days
untill he passed away
and in his humble will he asked
she be placed in his grave.

Still she dreams, that sleeping queen
of princes, farmers and artisans.
But she always shines her brightest
when she dreams of the homeless man.

The Doctors point and whisper
With crude and handmade tools.
Pinch and cut and decompress
like blood soaked sweating ghouls.
A slash, a snap, a sting
make a finger move.
The swollen eye, it twitches
and the mouth begins to drool.

Still no heartbeat, still no life
in the body, three days dead,
yet there is the softest sentence
uttered by the head;
Slipping slug-like out
from desperate lips in dread.
With unfocused twitching eyes
this is what it said:

"Let this one thing still be sacred;
The shroud between the dead and living.
Let the sleeping dogs now lie,
The Dead we're never meant to sing.
"Don't bring Death to Living lands
Don't take back the hourglass sand.
Leave the idols where they stand.
Leave the blood on bloodstained hands."

The doctor ***** his head:
"Is there movement in the brain?"
Another doctor shakes his own:
"None that can sustain"
Sowing shut his lips they say:
"Disturb us not again".
But a wordless sorrow is intact
in the soul that still remains.

Once again they dig in deeper
to find the glitch that kills.
With their knives and scissors
and noises crude and shrill.
The dead head slowly drops
with eyes wet, wide and still,
that meet the eye of a mocking bird
upon the window sill.

If given the option of sinner or saint
I’d sin in a second if two were too late
to encounter this conscience, to conquer this Eden
however blasphemic, however forbidden.
And sinner I am if so be your will,
in pursuit but persuaded and powerless, still;
I pace as I pray for the Unpromised Land
of you in my heart, and my soul in your hand.

A suicide of my best sides,
a homocide, a matricide.
Occupied in nursing
self-inflicted wounds inside
my heart, my soul, my final goal
is near. I tear with nailless claws
at where the door I used to know
was before I tore the hole inside
and so I tried to justify
the single, once perfected try
to go, to fly, escape outside
these walls, these halls
these calls I hear
are tearing at my soul, I lay
and lie and cannot cry.
I swear and curse in sour lines,
but noone knows the pain
experienced inside.

Trapeses strung on Shakespare lines;
vivid like the richest wines.
The arts unite and intertwine
in stunts of cruel dimensions.
Trembling hands in steady hold,
tears behind a mask so bold.
Go for silver, go for gold;
the thirty piece temptation.

Hazard games in clairvoyants’ house,
a faceless crowd he can’t arouse.
-Another jester, another Faust
or another fallen angel?
Unimpressed, the shroud of frost
between him and his viewing host
blurres his polished contraposte
to an unknown, misplaced stranger.

“A twist and spin performed so well
from a drape-framed prison-cell
a droplet from an empty well
to myriads of eyes.
A face so wet with silver tears
behind the smiling mask he wears,
like gems behind a dragon’s lair,
drop diamonds where he cries.”

Irae, the jester of the court,
the one and only of the sort,
knows his tricks are running short,
and whispers; “come what may”;
All comes down to his final jest,
the only unseen joke that’s left;
his very own zoolock-life-theft,
and thus then, dies Irae.

Once upon a time was a girl named Candy
Sweet as a flower and loved all so much.
She was granted a wish by a fairy named Mandy
that turned into candy all that she touched.

The town was filled with the sweets of Candy
the rocks and the houses and bicycles too.
Candy would say that the world was just dandy!
parading the streets in her candy suede shoes.

But everything ends and also for Candy
when all that she touched would turn into sweets.
Realising a candy-lover's not handy
she walked alone on candy-cobbled streets.

And loneliness came like a night over Candy
crying skittles she soon went insane.
She cursed the wish she was granted by Mandy
as she crumbled and cracked like a candy cane.

For the rest of the year the children ate candy
the rocks and the houses and bicycles too.
The children would say that the world was just dandy
and the last sweet they shared was a candy suede shoe.

Ravenous crows hover above the altar on the forest floor,
watching, peering, proud but fearing. Circling down more and more

And I recall you running, I recall you hide.
The heart you would give was invisible inside.
The laughter running like a silver creek,
where can it be now, is it hidden in their beaks?

If I've lost you I don't know
but your heart is my own, though it's cold as stone.
I still can feel you here my dear
and your lidless they eyes can't but stare.
-Speak of your emerald eyes and the pearls they cried,
your ruby smile and your obsidian lies;
It's all collected here and it's all so strong.
Not a part is missing, not a jigsaw puzzle-piece is gone.

Well enshrined here inside
my sacred, my secret museum of art.
Holy, enthroned, precious, my own,
one of a kind; your heart.

And as they're soon to feast, these grey clay-coloured beasts
land carefully and hide next to where you lie.
They anticipate, then they thank their fate
and start pecking at your thighs and what once was where your eyes were.

And the blood stained brittle beaks part in thanks and shriek
with confession in their cries.
We all gave in, it was no sin;
-We love you, the crows and I