Many years ago I tried
to leave time behind

in its hunt for the journey's end
we had forgotten the afterglows

and so we parted ways, leaving
trails of colliding sparks

only–––––––––––




–––––––––––it was I
who was left behind

When time gave up on lost causes
the wish for forever sinned.

I awoke in a dream
and
       pushing away the covers
arose

The lights dazzled me
a bright shimmer of aurora
speckles of play

Footsteps light on the carpet
parquet leaping aside
slipping down the steps

and the outside
      grasping eternity
dimmed and paled

Morbid voices and
forgotten faces
but I cannot see––––––––

and murmurs to my peace
soft touches and
distant kisses

I awoke in my dreams
and
      pulling my lovers close
went back to sleep.

Life speaks itself at the flicker of a lantern
bridging the gaps of the heart strings for a fraction
and then disappearing

Melting on the silence of the fireflies like
dreaming clouds of the winter
effervescent blindly

Life spearheads itself into the deepest chasms
watchful for the oncoming spurts of unknown
and frightful always

Whispering on the darkness of watchers
whisking down the road of the past
coloured dark blue and grey

Life has passed me by like time
crawling along at its own providence
harming no one

I wandered the desert wasteland
A pack of burning sun on my back
It tore my eyesight in two

Oases loomed and dissolved
Nothing but blue sky overhead
And circling scavengers

Helium shot to my brain
The taste of tainted blood
And numbing wounds

It's raining
Beastly thudding down on the warped iron
Time and universe spinning on the axes of doubt
And we dance like there was no other way out of it

It's raining
Slipping down the courtyard of breeze
Climbing the ascension to the mountains of the gods
Scaling the pits of our own little daemonium

It's raining
Ringing in my ears there are
Yellowed jackets and fighting roars
Decrepit words of the random past

It rains
Like thunder and lightning make no sense
Pouring into the concrete jungles and sealing
Sentience in its benevolent hands

Spiders grasp our flesh
Tear it apart
Who would say otherwise?
Take it and rend
Rend and grate

Whispers of the darkness
resound in my head.

Sleep

I have the hallways of dawn
buried somewhere in my soul
gripping me tightly in our bonds
as we travel the stars and wandering lights
blissful and forever
spinning threads of sacrificial innocence
toying with the clouds of the earth
and pulling the effervescent strings of our universe

Paying the price for our solitude
leaving our eyes behind
settling for wings half-broken but
never letting go
and to be free–––––

Egging me on
hushed in the whispers of infinity
invisible for fragments and
tracing all others on their way
glittering terras and daylights
hiding together

Dreams
always holding my hand
all along the way

I hear
Lamentation

They would always start the chants by daybreak
Waking me from my already-light slumber
Allowing me to rub my weary eyes for moments
Before the deep chime of the bell signalled daylight

I could never understand
their devout worship
as they fell on their knees
murmuring words unheard to me

But somehow there was something about the air
Perhaps it was the incense always lit at the altars
Maybe it was the quiet drone of their prayers
Other times it must have been the sight of nature

Years and years I spent in its hallways
Always longing for the world outside
Dreaming for the odd heaven-sent journey
That would sometimes come flying my way

Now I have different dreams
Shown to me in elusive conical shades
Driving the roots of every reverie
Deep into my very core
Flashes of other years
Distant images unknown to me
Illuminated by every hue and colour
Lulling me gently

But what it is to dream differently
Yearn for the silence in the world
Creeping up to us on dusk
Sweeping apprehension

Finally I returned home
Dropping all my weight
Pressing my forehead over
to breathe.

Rake in the leaves
Sweep out the memories
Exhale out the dust
Take in the reveries

I love the swaying of the trees
In my summer sunshine
The gusts of winter courting the scent of lime.

Acres of yellow
Flocks of the white
Greeting yards of children all in plain sight.

Wonders of the ocean
Salt and water and sky
Blueish like the reflection of the clouds in your eye.

Rise of the light
In the glory of the gods
Singing in the full expanse of the prairies of love.

Empirical quests
In the burst of the works
Inhaling in the gorgeous yuletide of the earth.

Time in the nothing
Worries of the trite
Enbosom me in the absence of the darkness of the night.

Light petals flowing off the creek
And gentle breezes whipping through our hair
Watching the idle clouds smile at us
And lull us as time sleeps on

Grasping the stars the moment they appear
Sparkling in their early sunbath and laughing otherwise
Greeting us in careful glimpses
Mesmerising so

Days we spent dreaming of the oceans
And wandering our boundless expanses
The horizons and the sights
Soothing as always

We huddle beneath the dark curtains
psychedelic lights illuminating our walls
despite the dimmers––––––

and the silent hum of machines
whirring about outside
their blades cutting the night

day time would bring carnage
and so I prayed for light
never to come––––––––

murmurs and whispers from
solemn men whose eyes
were the only things I could see

clear blue skies inhabited
my blankest mind as we
lived our dying moments––––––––

and in the slipping warmth
the squeeze of my mother's hand
a smile and a whisper

momentary bliss
quiet and silence
before the war begins.

Streets lined with confetti
Cheering crowds waving flags
Delighted squeals of the young child
Even destitutes on holiday
And the sun burning its merry way on the sidewalks

Ascent of the podium
Big bow to everybody
More cheers
Slogans read: long live the hero
Happy days to come
and, no one shall stand in our way

The people hush
they quiet as the microphone moves closer
a smile:

I am no hero

––a pause––a cheer––

I am no hero

––another pause––no cheers––

There is no glory in killing
no honour in ending a life
that could have gone on to be so much more
a person who
had their own hopes
dreams––––––––––

––all is quiet over the square
and the sun continues to shine––

––––and people who loved them

There is no joy
in dealing pain
––and pain that never heals

––––silence––––




––a child cries––


a pain that is my pain
a pain that never goes away
a pain of hearing the last words of someone
who could have easily been your friend
your neighbour
your teammate
your best man
your brother––––

They always say: tell them... I love them
and who shall carry out this task?
the one who slew them?

––––––––––––––––––––

so I keep it with me
forever, and perhaps in time
someone will pass it on

––––mostly they stay ungiven
until this generation passes
and that unhealing pain follows us away
and then we go on over and over again

So I don't think that we should say
that we are heroes today
we are no heroes
we are only survivors
victims of a dying breed
and ebbing slowly.

––––a silence––––

The sun continues to shine.

These days the moon seems unnaturally bright
Its amber angels bashing eyelids towards me
and how the snow litters the ground to the southern valley
mirroring the sky––

The glittering ocean of white speckles
Tickling our noses as we quietly pass them by
treading the moonlight frost for moments
and letting them thaw in our footsteps

The fleet-footed page boy of the ascent rivers
Glimmering by like a star-lit heaven
sidelines of the arena we watched together
as the planets guided our way

Freer than ever from the rising corals
Hovering in the midst of our winter day
lining our worlds and their fading corpses
crests in our never ending stories

Dawn breaks too early in the silent north
Its frozen statues flashing merry tinkles at me
heading alone outward for some lighter horizon
whispering every step–––

Moonlight, daylight
Time in all my days
Light the fire of the hearth
Crease the wrinkles in my space

Moonlight, daylight
Hope in the sparkle of dreamland
Take me to the seams of time
How far my sight will span

Moonlight, daylight
Pull in the shores of memory
Mirror me in the ocean
Take all the weight I will carry

Moonlight, daylight
Grasp of night in sound
Eclipse my soul of division
To what chains we are bound

Moonlight, daylight
Spear the winds of spice
In my heart of yesterday
Time can wane the price

Moonlight, daylight
Speak in all ways of life
Choke on wishes of longing
We watch the sunset
in daylight.

One-time policy

Took me off the heels of summer
Plunged me into the arctic lakes
Made a while in the company of whales
Grasping their goals tight

One-time policy

Graded in time by curving up
Trite in the trepidations of man
Flight in the wires and dire in its soles
Dry up the rivers in my eden

It's just a scratch

Pack up the tyres and grip my heart
Taken in the wings of an ethereal siren
Opulence in the labels and my sight
Greeting my memories

Gorge on life

And in the chasm of eternity I wonder
Seeing the slit of sky and pondering all essence
Shriek like ravens and pour trifles in
Gentle flowing of slopes on the rise–––––

Wait
There's something coming

A twinkle somewhere far away
A sparkle in the distance
You'd always run for it notwithstanding
All the pain and hurt for falling

Maybe the caricatures were true enough
Maybe you were always crying
Maybe I never saw it real
Or maybe you really were lying

Flowers of tomorrow

She takes to the fields with less than a goodbye
Embracing all the soul of the sun, wind, sky

Silhouettes as we are left in the shadow of the door
The cover of all bright lights giving us solitude

Neon in the alleyways of greased memories
Injured beyond the thoughts of my dying reveries

Occluded by periphery and gargantuan senses
Implicit in their discovery of the ***** of time

Hope and death and sorrow and gain
Paint all the gates of joy and sacrifice

Meander in the fields of the day
Yesterday and today take up my way.

Yesterday
in the cotton folds of the black eye
a startled sentience exploded with atomicity
building up in power and decimating the dust lanes beside
as we lay in the comforts of our littlest cores

and spraying its jets across the galaxies
touching the oldest star lights beyond
crimson and aqueous in all amber echoes
crushing down our systems of eternal purity
pulling together and dissipating

for millenia distances meet by vibrations
conflicts of heart and the love of joy
rearing their ugly colours in brevity
but shattering consciousness for moments––––––––

My head spins
I can't sleep
The world whispers its memories of you
And in the bay's reflection the pain
Lurches like sandstorms.

It's the
Last day

Tomorrow they said they'd come for you
Sure I believe they'll be on time
They always are

Then I suppose they'll take you to some
****-house in the middle of nowhere
Work you till you drop and
Die

Underneath all that grimy face and ***** hands you
Still grin at me in that childish act
Waving maggots in my face

Tomorrow they'll come take you somewhere
I don't know what to do with the cash
But it'll feed the other kids enough

It's the
Last day

Thought I'd give you a treat
Went to the outside and brought back
Some meat
Chucked it in the fire
Let it singe for a bit
You gnawed on it like chocolate

Tomorrow they'll come take you away
And there's nothing I can do about it.

The landscape is colourless, featureless
What defines it is the sky
The crashing clouds and circulating wind
That flies beyond our human sight and
Cuts the horizon beyond its borders.

Sometimes it changes like the flow of
Time, the universe and everything
Can you see it morphing?
In your deep eyes, those flashes of light
Mean nothing but colour.

What is colour to us?
What is colour to me?
Colour is nothing
For colour only decorates and
Says nothing substantial
Giving it life while
Taking ours away
Like blinking specks of diminishing light.

You are colourless in my eyes.

She stands on the edge
Watches the setting sun
Tells me the stories of a
Faded and distant past
Many memories away

Her frock billows and I
Catch a glimpse of a dyed tear
Dissipating into the wind

Like thunder she has
Captivated the hearts of people
Taken in their minds and
Turned the tide in her hands

But nothing for me
Nothing like that in the darkness
Nothing like the heaviness of drink
After the throbbing of the head begins

She smiles and
Taking me in with her eyes
Tilts her head slightly to show

Earrings dangling in the light
Sparkle against the dying sun
While we watch the stars shining

She turns to watch the shoot
Flapping in the universe as it
Plummets to its death

And I am just that to her
Disappearing and forever
Longing to stay
But effervescent
Evanescent
Discontent

She stands on the edge
Watches the setting sun
Turns away from me

She's all I would ever want
And she is nothing.

Spurious words and spinning wheels
grasping the unmade road
crossing streams of deserted hinterlands
sparing no weakness

Plenty in the fork of the day
shining down like twilight
whittling down the breeze of night
and smashing up the stars

Meandering past the lazy groves
grain in corsets
musk in roses
pushing the littlest hearts
and raising their eyes to the sky
a glimpse and a glimmer
sparkle of the waters
and we were unshackled
lost

In more ways than one
you whispered in the tiniest hours
and I heard the edges of your echoes
resounding slowly and gradually
rebounding for more
filling the universe.

I was always vaguely aware

Colour the sky and the wrinkles of time
Mother paints the wallpapers
Sweeps the leaves of yesterday
Sighing in the magnitude of endeavours

Everything seems so distant, forgotten
Nobody remembers it anymore
Chiselled and chapped like my lover's lips
Crawling in the dawns of their reveries

You have something that they need

It takes the gut, silence and dissipation
Grief or sanctuary in the aisles of light
Pay me a kiss or sparkle the sunshine
Exhaling nature in the voids of abyss

Joy of the times, in cream of sin we settle
Growth of the words and the dimming passion
The pacing of the trees have gotten louder and wider
Ash to azure and brazen in the forge

Within and without I miss you whenever
Encryptions and deception in the miles of my life.

Checked myself yesterday
wondered if my soul was intact
that, and the seams that hold it together
its sense and social competence
its gait and many faces
its sainthood and devillish endeavours
and all other things

Washed down everything thoroughly before
I reckoned I was ready to see you
the perfection down to the littlest detail
at least, what passes as perfection
glazing over and stopping short
of reeling and swooning at
the mere whiff of your scent

Cleared the hoops between
the long sidewalk jog of endurance
hearing the cars whisk by and wishing
that they'd give me a lift - for what seems important
that brief moment when my eyes find their sockets

The sun will rise as I
slowly make my way into the compound
find the snug spot between the walls that they
seem to have left empty for me
while I might watch from the window panes
wonder if you would look over
and pay me some attention
though often, I
pass the entire day
watching but never found

To work the night shift and spend the daytime waiting
tailing your silhouette like an empty vagrant
grasping onto nothing as the world ignores my presence
like they did always
like they did yesterday

Chatter, as I watch the snowdrops falling
It blends in from the street, the pavement, the everything but me
and the lonelier soles who walk their own ways in the path
Taking their own hands against the cold.

Distances there into and always with the twilight
Strings and biscuits in the dawn of the twice
Winds pass and monsoons sweep through
Often I watch them in the memories of you.

Cross the sidewalks, mirrors, delights
Christmas parties and silent enchantments
Invisible but dwelling in the darkness of the stars
So humbling in all the georgian opacity

I yearn for the lights of the morning essence
Dream of the warmth in the hearth of men
Assuming in vain the welcome of all night blankets
And grieve in the vacancy of the traveller's awe.

Who takes the broom of the closets past
Who walks the dawn and evening stars
Who fawns over the reflection of the moon
Who tells of my works in their brilliant cocoon?

Take off your clothes, you said

Morning
The light simmering in
Sneaking up on our sleeping souls
Waking us gently
Making you moan

The breeze
Through the boughs that we
Had spent the night rocking all over
In jubilation
Quietly

Meandering
The streams washing off
The dirt and grime of our happiness
Rolling down
Evanescent

And the moon
Lighting our nights
And the next nights
And the ones after
Ever smiling

I could close my eyes
Lose them
Feel only your breath
Peeling at my skin
And the scent of love
Creeping around me

How I could deny my infatuation
In the arms of the goddess
Joyfully lulling me to sleep

Thinking about it, for example
Sometimes I was astounded at how I used to be able to
Do everything with such confidence

Examine the flight of a bird, attempt to copy it
See the world in my eyes and laugh
Because it all seemed so wonderful

How there were times, when the littlest of things
Could make me tear at the eyes with happiness
Or burn in my ears with rage

Now everything fades, like the colour that dissipates
I see the sunshine sliding through my eyelids
But only just, never reaching its destination

I always told myself that it would be okay
The world would shut itself away, but I would
Like I always had, continue smiling

The sky has shunned me forever now
It takes its pride in something else
And leaves the petals of the closed flower untouched

Maybe there were times when I should have
Tried harder, done better, does it matter?
I don’t even know whether or not it would have changed anything

The world keeps loud and racing
Nothing silent for me
All the entry-points blaze with fire

I am heathen, and all that has passed
Is testament to its existence
Though somehow I cannot see

I can barely make out the sunshades, and they
Twinkle at me with delight
My last rays of light

While I missed the morning star.

"Hello, police."

"Good morning, officer.
My name is Ashley Williams.


I am in the woods, at the end of Autumn Street.



I will be hanging myself.

Please come and get my body.




Thank you for your time."

Tell me stories
of a honey-coloured love
Time immemorial
and sweetly scented doors

Fine me heartaches
in the absence of the stars
Gazing forever
through the silence of descent

Urge me gently
on the road of reveries
Rising dawns
in the howl of morning bees

Miss me terribly
from the quiver of your lips
Haunted softly
by the touch of kind strangers

Watch me tenderly
of thoughts in dreary days
Fondly forgetting
our many silhouetted ways

Every yuletide it comes the time
under the blanket of nirvana
where I remember you for brief flickers
in the light of better days

I liked that you understood
While the rain was hammering down
And we were on my bike
How everything always hurt
Even though you never said anything about it.

My shadows would sneak up on me
and in the morning you would find me
down some alleyway sleeping
rubbing my eyes awake when you came up
and smiling anyway.

I liked the way we used to
Spend the afternoons on the block
Eating ice-creams and kicking sidewalks
Before you would go on home and I would
Wander the streets until everything felt right.

Maybe the purple sky should have said
It's time for you to go
Nine times over I think to myself
Yeah, that's right
You really should go.

And so you did, you went
Masking all your fears and apprehension
And I was left there, on the dock that day
When you left on the ship to heaven
Never to return,

But then again
Where would you be now if you hadn't gone?
On my bike, in the rain again
Or down that alleyway sleeping with me
In the snow.

The lines on her flesh
The slightly closing eyes
The breath
Just barely

Everyday I'd wait for you at the top of the stairs
Hiding in the shadows as the morning glare peeked through
Shining on the boxes that I had stacked up in the night
While I gnawed on my hunger

You'd come up for several minutes
Whisper to me in our stolen time
Let me smell you all over in brief embraces
And then leave

Moments in the breaks of my lightwatch
Nights and the descent of the wolves on the hunt
The scent of dusk and the ever blinking stars
And the creaking of bicycles treading through the woods

I'd look you all over in the darkness of the moon
Taste the weariness through the souls in our eyes
Mildew and the chirps of homecoming birds
Warming our bodies in unison

The whips of sunshine would come again
We'd scramble away from each other
Dislodging our joints and other such things
Tightening the knots

Every fragment I'd wait for your silhouette
Luminance granting me brief glimpses
Drawn through the curtains of prying eyes
And the numerous opuses creasing our hearts

The dots of Orion in the amber snow
Greeting our hands and chalking the rain
Pyres of pain make the distances scarce
And burrowing in my chest we'd sit
Burning in the ashes of twilight.

Pocket for my faith
I miss you in the drizzling of the rain
The path through the paddy fields
Our continental shame

It never occurs to us
While we spend our time walking
Through the streets of dull colour
How much the world sees us
Like twins of a solar system
Endearing but distant

Assistant to my city
A cry for help in denial
We hold our hands and smile
Children twisting up the spiral

Palette for my eyesight
I think of you in the clouds of the world
Painting the silence of the ages
Choosing everything simple

The iron-crusted walls
And the solitary diamonds
Watch us like laughing soldiers
As we walk the hallways of the future
Taking circles round and round
Without inhibition

Clinking glasses of timeless deeds
We hear chats through centuries
I stab the heralds of effervescent chimes
Whenever the dust settles

Palace of my innocence
I kiss you in the ebbing of memories
Say words to soothe both ends
And sit to write our stories.