He floated free that small warm day,
and stands accused of poetry,
from underneath the whisper tree.
Its limbs lean down close, as if to say
his only chance has slipped away,
gone.
Like happiness after failure tears
your pride from you and lets you find
the rows of heartache left behind
by others who refused to hear,
and have been gone ten thousand years.
Gone like the smile that pity stole.
Like puppet strings left hanging loose,
by hands and brain that could not choose.
The heart as dwarf, the mind as troll,
the stringless puppet with no soul.
Without the hands the puppet slides
too far down for healing light.
Though he tries with all his might,
no wires to help him stand upright,
he finally quits and soon decides
that crying goes on when cutting is done.
While far away the assassin watches,
and the fire inside exactly matches
the burned out place his fear is from.
No phoenix from this ash will come.
No memories of the finery,
no angled light on sleeping face
in this broken empty place.
These missing crooked lines will be
the last thing that he does not see.
Gone like the words to happy songs;
The puppet knows his time has passed.
The dance he danced has been outclassed,
the gravity was just too strong,
will make him dust before too long.
He knew all this before he wrote his tune,
the whisper tree was quiet then;
He was about to try it when
he floated free that small warm June,
lasted too long, over too soon.
The sadness wins, the winter steals September.
He tries to see ahead for reasons
but it looks the same for many seasons,
as it has been as long as he remembers.
This will be the last thing that he sends her.
And nights, no matter how he tries,
the images so fiercely staring down;
the frightful smile, the menacing frown.
Weary and weak, he still sleepless lies,
no phoenix from this ash will rise.
Written about twenty years ago.