The shell falls
Following the boom
Where everything is still in motion
Like a whispy smoke trail
Rising steadily from an iron chamber
Or the shock received from an expected impact
That brings attention to the action
Down the sights
As a slight ringing bombards the senses
Into a state of catatonic ambiguation
It becomes clear that the target set
Is wholly unaffected
By the decision to shoot
In turn
Reducing the validity of the attempt
Yet it is not a wasted round
But grounds to attempt another shot
And another
Until the bullet hits the mark
Which is metaphorically
Your heart
===============================
Failure is not an option
So we try
Try again

Stolen on the wings of the canary
Soaring within the clouds
And bouncing within hidden canopies
Is a song known only to the sun
And certain flowers

Trapped, the song pleads
In early morning
And in the dusk of shadows
"Hear me sing 'o lonely forest!"
Yet, sadly she found there was nobody to serenade

Frantic, the canary ruffled her feathers
Searching for just one ear;
One soul willing to listen to her precious
Color held captive

You see, it was yellow what stole the canary
For its song had long since seduced her
Dying the white of her genesis golden
After months spent dancing
In tune to swaying southern honeysuckle
Or simply chasing the setting sun
Soaking up every sweet note
Of yellows orchestra

Defeated, the canary found a secluded tree
Alone atop a barren mountain
And sang one final time
"Hear me sing 'o lonely earth
For I have taken that which is yours and have made it mine!"
She spread her petite wings,
Each feather a ray of sunlight,
"Hear me sing, for you 'o mighty mother
Are the only one willing to listen..."

Then, the canary cried
And with each tear dropped
Individual notes in shades of yellow
As her feathers bleed revealing her true self
A pristine white
Unblemished by the envy of color
Finding she was finally satisfied
With her own song

I challenge you to consider life.

Ask of yourself the greatest of riddles
Determine the mightiest conundrums
That inspire and awaken your inner detective
Become The Batman and realize your inner hero
Be more than ordinary and ask of authority: "Why?"
Because you are more than just a sheep
But instead a product of a question
With no simple answer
Yet beholden to every solution
All you must do is think
And consider life and all of its mysteries

Challenge accepted.

From Publius
To Livia

I'm writing to tell you
I will no longer work your fields

For too long my sweat bled to make you look good
Mine harvest fed the entire eternal city
For months!

Yet you'd eyes only for the leadened ***** of
Gaius
And
Marcus
It's a wonder you haven't gone blind yet

Or mayhaps you have?

It would explain your complete and utter ignorance
Of the goings on right outside your window!

Those furrows
I plowed
That terrace
I built
Those grapes
I grew

I nurtured this land long before you
And Marcus

Originally,
It was just myself and Gaius
Charged with taming wild Ceres
Transforming forest to field
Then field to farm
A cornucopia of plenty

Then you came along
Your drooling dog in tow
Salivating the discord of Discord
While gorging yourself on Gaius' selfish lies
Taking credit for mine own efforts
And treating me as a mere shadow on the wall

Invisible to all

Well,
I prayed to the Capitoline Triad
I offered a white bull to Jupiter the king
And asked him to command radiant Sol
To shine bright on your shade
And bless me with brighter horizons

I begged jealous Juno
To send windy ****** to blow you off course
Along with your precious pets
Hopefully you'll crash on Sicilian shores
With only furious Polyphemus for company
For this I burned frankincense and myrrh

To ****** Minerva
A libation of mine own wine
So she might reveal your true arachnid self
A punishment for your self aggrandizing arrogance
Thinking yourself wiser in the art of cultivation
Than the goddess of wisdom herself

Dear Livia,
You should be worried

Already my horizons brighten
As yours begins to dim in mine absence
And slowly, your guise of perfection is slipping
Revealing six sinewy legs, dagger tipped
And fangs dyed red with innocent blood

The Gods have heard my prayers
And your web begins to unravel

Praise Olympus

Signed,
PERTINAX

From Publius
To Marcus

Marcus, I must apologize:
It is true that I said you were as Antinous
To Gaius' Hadrianus,
But do not fret, it was not in jest;
I truly did ask the Gods to curse you so.

You see, this farm,
This land,
Has been my ward long before you...
In your Janus mask,
Were hired.
At least that God understands the difference
Between war and peace.

Unlike you, dear Marcus,
Who brings only chaos to the fields;
A greater pestilence than any drought or rot.
You are the weevil that spoils the grain,
Corrupting all around you.

Poor Gaius has already fallen
Under your impious spell.
His fields grow fallow from association
With you Marcus!

What shame you bring your family
With your lazy immorality,
Incapable of discerning right from wrong,
Lest it be ascribed by your new dominus, Gaius,
Whose skin your claws flay with fatal flattery.

All this while I tend both your fields,
And mine own,
Working myself to the bone;
The heat, and sweat, and bugs,
Reminiscent of Pluto's underworld.
To honor my family.
To feed my family.

I honor my ancestors Marcus!
Daily, I make offerings to Gods of house and state
At my household alter;

The Capitoline triad overflow with my piety,
Bringing abundance to mine soul and soil alike.
Plenty, that you, sweet Antinous, claim as your own.

No longer.
I'm divorcing myself from all of you.
You can have the land.
As it stands it would make a beautiful wedding plot.
I've even gone to the trouble of forging you a ring,
Meticulously sourced from your masters ****!

Consider it a fragrant farewell
From your favorite fan,
Who will fondly not remember you,
Even as you scramble without me,
And miss the coattails you rode,
To usurp my home.

Woe to the plow;
Proscribed to die in rust.

Signed,
PERTINAX

The flame boils upon the cauldron
Sparks arc in fuels exhaustion
An explosion erupts among scattered embers

Fire
Seams that trace natures cunning
Within evil facade impressed
Upon purely good
That is
Life
Which burns with the radiance of the sun
A passion diminished by no quality
Other than itself
An expression to be

The passion roils as temperature boils
The soul to ghastly pieces
Imploding within itself when faced with itself

The clouds scamper along the horizon
Bringing with it a breeze of life
Ever so succulent
Like the sweet smells from a jungle canopy
Ripe with fruit and flowers of all variety
Accompanied by the sing song melodies
Of crickets
Chirp, chirp, chirping
And bees
Buzz, Buzz, buzzing
As the breeze weaves it's way through the trees
Causing a deep moan sporadic in nature
Then... rain...
Falling out of nowhere
Furious
Lightning flashes as thunder follows
Upsetting the breeze to a gust
Speeding up the world in a fast
Sorta
Slow motion
That yields sight to rushing lime greens
And bowing brown boughs
Caught within the torrent of life
Only the forest may know

I gaze into the eternity beyond pupils dilation
Where soul has lost sole control of the spirit
And the darkness that grips twists the mind
Warping memories into incoherent phantoms
Wailing in anguish as I brush them aside

Gazing deeper,
Beyond the pale of of my mortal coil
Searching for an answer that nature neglects
Written not in emerald green starbursts,
Shrouded by grey washed blue skys,
But further, beyond the heavens
Where night stretches beyond Terra Firma
And empty space reigns in perpetual waltz
Aging as my eye progresses towards the birth
When light was given life and purity was pure
Before the infection of the question
That has no answer

Nor did it need,
For there I found looking back as if a mirror
My reflection staring at itself in amazement
For I had solved the theory of everything
By knowing thyself… beyond myself

This tourniquet tightens
Like quicksand
In a sunscorthed wasteland
As the sun bakes the parched land
To such an inhospitable temperature
I can no longer breathe
When the pressure of coping
Strangulates me with decisions
Of love and loss
Lost within the deadly current
That is introspection
And inspiration
Which coexist
In a binary partnership
Between life and death
...
Until my last gasp
...
The hanging bell tolls

From Publius
To Terra

Salve amore mea

I bid you greetings from the new land
Though I am saddened by your absence
It is a necessary grief

Think not on the sweaty tasks unsuitable
For a beauty such as you
A house you deserve
A house I shall build

A grand atrium will await your arrival
Flowers and Garland will be strewn
To parade your coming

The triumphant wife
Whose radiant reflection shines as a goddess
Mine impluvium turned caldarium

Enter further and I'll have built for you
A grand hallway
Paved with mosaic representations of great Jove
And pastoral murals of our farm and ****** Ceres

Finally, I'll show you to your bed chamber
Finely furnished for the royalty of my love
Crowned in soaring arches crossed in such a way
That creates perfect cubes painted with dancing Cupid
Whose bow I've aimed to forever seal your heart

To mine own

When I draw the arrow
Feathers knocked to sunburned cheeks
And let loose my desire to hold you close
And erase the distance of space between
Our farm
And your home

All I've left to do is build and till and sow
May Sol, Luna, and yourself
Watch over me from afar
With love and well wishes

I will write you soon with more tales from the field
Until then, the work continues...

Vale amore mea,

PERTINAX

The tendons strained as muscles tensed
Hind legs wobbled in impatient anticipation
The prey grazed slowly upon springs bounty
A twig snapped sounding natures alarm
Crows called cooing caws as they took wing
A ****** predicting the coming violence
The die having been cast elicited a roar
Potential energy unleashed sprang an ambush
Teeth and claws punctured and lacerated flesh
Jaws clenched throat choking life from limb
Latent spasms birthed pleasurable moans
The irony of blood tasted copper coins
As stipes became lost in red matted fur
The **** draining the thrill of the hunt
While the tiger ate his fill

Seasons change
Just ask the jay
Whose plume is blue
As the sky
After a fierce rain
Inundates the land
Bringing with it winds
Whose currents lift the jay
To dance among scattered clouds
Waving a final goodbye
To the warmth of summer sun
Setting past falls forward
Into winters grasp
Whose chill shocks the jay
With visions of ice and snow and frost
A sign to migrate to warmer climbs
Where fall has fallen backward
And summer sun rises anew
Challenging the changing season
To remain sunny and blue

"There is no story worth telling"
He said
After I asked him of his loss
The man seemed blank,
Empty,
Without regards to his obvious depression
In a denial that was building,
Block by block,
A wall around the sadness he hid inside
His stoic exterior sent shivers up my spine
Attributing to a lurking fear
That perhaps this man had broken,
Snapped,
And maybe just one slip of tongue
Would trigger an eruption
Of repressed emotion
Itching to find an expression
Yet he remained cool like ice
That forms in the nights of winter
With eyes burning hotter
Than the streets in summer
As he repeated his mantra
"There is no story worth telling"
At which point he walked off the roof
Taking his loss with him

Seamless we fray
Torn at the seems
Ripped to shreds
As love shears
Our minds
And hearts
Yet mere cuts
Do little to lacerate
The magnetism
That bonds two souls
Stronger than any rending
Splitting or slashing
Capable of separating
Or dividing
Our two hearts
From splicing

A dim haze silhouetted the mire
A gurgling burble swirled beneath
A twirled stump rotten in decay
A deer struggled frantic to escape
A high pitched wailing and flailing
A deep moan and groan followed by
A silence
A stench welled up as flesh decayed
A harsh hiss as the acid fizzed
A fetid fragrance that wafted to join
A dim haze that silhouetted the mire

The symmetry of the soul is lost on me
There are no straight lines between
Right and wrong
It is asymmetry
That leads me to conclude
Morality exists above the laws
Attainable only to the few that understand
Truth is a prelude
Or a lovely ode
Dissonant in its ever changing nature
To the point that it alludes
Even the holiest codes
As I sit here on my throne
And consider this crooked reality
Never to be certain
Philosophy is my home
==============================
It is through uncertainty
Where we certainly
Feel alive enough
To ask the question
Why?

The great flood had begun;
Replacing the land with a waterworld dotted with mountain top islands;
Arks of mammalian preservation.

It was there I stood as the moon fell.

Night had never been so bright;
Luna inching ever closer;
Craters becoming more and more visible;
Resolution broadcasting high definition;
I raised my hands to the sky;
Reaching out to catch the massive satellite;
First contact came as my hands bore down;
Soft silt of the gray quality puffed;
My arms and legs began to bend;
The weight so tremendous that the effort shook my body;
Hers as well;
My left knee struck the land;
Terra redoubling my efforts;
Heaving with all my might I shrugged;
Sending the moon back towards the heavens;
I watched silently;
Luna was returned to her orbit;
The flood began to dissipate as tidal forces resumed;
Leaving me alone;
Hands to the sky on one knee;
Looking down at the world;
From the mountain of Everest.

It was a plainly written script offering little explanation into the intricacies of life after death.

To quote

"For every new beginning there is a new ending"

Perplexed, I took it upon myself to attempt to explain such vagueness in a way only a poet can.

What follows is to be known as:

The Prime Covenant

As I stand on the thresholds of death
I can see the landscape of my life
Spread out against the horizon in frames
Within one I see my birth
Kicking and screaming as I met the light
(Curious because, in life, this moment was fast forgotten following the burst of new experience)
To take in the sights of my mother
So proud to have her only child
That she clung to me through joyful tears
Then my fresh eyes caught my father
Shaken to the core after experiencing
The recreation of his own birth
For I was like him and he was as me
(In between all these new wonders rose my first breath, which was so sweet that even the frame of the memory shuddered from excitement)
Through it all I see the memory of love
That can only be found in lifes first moment

From the corner of my peripherals
A new frame caught my eye
Where I stood for the first time
Following months of incessant beckoning
From my parents to abandon the crawl
That had led me away from infancy
Flashes of fear and pure joy mingled together
Leading to my first step
Which led to another
To another
So rapidly I couldn't control the momentum
FREEDOM!
And then I was running
(The fastest toddler alive if you ask my father)
My legs taking me far and wide to explore
The wide world around me as the frame shifted

Orienting itself into a picture of me
And my first favorite tree
A magnolia standing taller than any God
A child could hope to fathom
But also small enough a mountain
To not stay my freshly found love of movement
Until I was at the top
Looking down at a world wider than comprehension
As flicks of terror stained the frame red
When the screams of my mother
Snapped me back to the reality
That I was a toddler in a tree
My tree

Driven away by panic the frames spun forward
Like that button on old school casset players
Comprised of two sideways triangles
Where every frame appeared frozen
While also moving
Until I sickened of the pace and settled
On a frame seemingly dark
(Bits of angry red and sad grey completing the new patina)
That revealed a new memory of forgotten times
A time where tears prevailed for all accounted
There stood my father, frozen in the door
(The screen partially open to allow his head to poke through)
And my mother, hand on my arm in a vice
Incoherent through sobs of lost love
As she dragged me away from the door
My arms flailing as I made a futile effort
To reconnect the two
...just two more steps...
Then I was in the car
(An old Ford pento if the frame is to be believed)
Reversing away from the driveway that was my home
From my first moments to my first tree
I wailed in what seemed agony
At my father's outstretched arms
Protruding from a screen door
Illequiped to hide his tears

Within the frames I became lost
Neither direction nor time having meaning
(For what end can be more traumatic then divorce for an innocent five year old?)
Here and there were glimpses into yet more
Beginnings lost to even more endings;
My first day at school...
The death of my grandfather...
My first kiss...
The end of my first friendship...

Friendship

The frame broke my distress and stole my focus
"David, my mom said it was alright if you stay the night at our house!"
I was excited
(Finally a reprieve from traumatic rememberances)
He said "Alright, I'll tell my dad and be over after school!"
He was excited
(His mom had died the year before due to something called 'overdose' and was constantly sad so it felt good to see such life come into him)
The frame grated into place a few hours later
My mother stood in the kitchen of our small trailer
Crying as she told me "I have something to tell you."
(I was eight and seeing her cry made me cry)
"What's wrong mommy?" I asked
She said "honey, we can't afford to live here any longer, your aunt is on her way to pick us up."
(According to the frames this was the fourth such occurance)
"But I invited David over like you said to stay the night!" I pleaded
To no avail as my aunt pulled up to take us away
From my first friendship

Distraught, I raged at the horizon
"Why do you toy with me so?!
You tease these memories of beginnings
Only to destroy them with endings!"
As if in reply the frames shook,
An internal earthquake occurred
And there she stood
My wife
Frozen in the frame of the first time we met
A memory I could never forget
As beautiful as a late afternoon sunset
Fixated, I took her in my arms
Refusing the frame to let go
Holding on through the fast forward
Of our first kiss...
The first time I met our kids...
Our first argument...
To my last breath...
"Though there may be endings to some beginnings, my love for you will never die...
I...
Love...
You..."

The frames ended similar to the last reel of film from an antique video
The light across the horizon faded
Yet I still held her frame
...never to let go...

You see, the Prime Covenant is the deal we make with ourselves upon entering this life.

We agree to feel love as equally as we agree to feel loss.

Life after death is the reward for making this pact so that even in the darkness that follows the light, the most wonderful beginning will always be with you beyond every end.

As the cannon erupts
The death knell tolls
Signaling the end of the war
Within myself
============================
For by sheer proximity
I am unable to maintain
A loving focus
No matter how trivial the pain
My weapon is set to automatic
Never stopping to reload
Ignoring every misfire
Intending to be the hero
Of one scarred with wear
Wary of the burdens that weaken
Even the greatest of men
So I take flight
When normalcy arrives
Terrified of the notions
Where memories reside
Preferable to heaven
And the wings upon which
Angel's fly
For it hath become demonic
Lamenting in it's path
Through death and destruction
A heart protecting gas mask
That chokes and restrains
The natural enmity
Between wants and needs
Which steadily reigns my dreams
Into focus
Before I can corrupt your inherent Beauty
With anger and greed
============================
Some people never leave the battlefield
Others just bring it home with them
============================
We are constant combatants
In a war that cannot be won
============================
The saboteur
Of the one

“To live is to learn“
He said as he held his crying son
Between sobs he felt fresh tears seeping into his coat
Damp reminders of times he himself broke down
Feeling the pressing weight of life and it’s expectations
He held the boy at arms length

“There was a time not too long ago…

The magnolias were in bloom
Sweet summer consumed sweet home
Alabama sang from the back of a black pickup
Doors open and tailgate down we loved the sound
Touchdown! rang across white cotton fields
Swaying in the gentle southern breeze
Whose caress cools the heat of the day
That buzzes with whirling dragonflies
And Hovering Toms humming to a bees melody
Blue Jays fought Bluebirds under blue skies
Pocked by slowly drifting cotton clouds
Lazily shape shifting into reflections of the land below
…
A rabbit, curious, ready to bounce
…
‘Ol Bo, the bird dog, pointing to a fresh ****
…
A deer, alerted, spooked by murderous cawing crows
…
All of this, seen by a boy in a tree
…

“Until he fell”
The father whispered to his son
Rolling up his sleeve he showed him the scar
“You see, my boy, I have broken a bone or two…
Some hearts
… Some dreams
Said things I didn’t mean…
Yet those magnolias still bloomed
The bees still buzzed
And birds either love or hate the color blue
Such is the nature of nature:
It is alive because it has learned to live“

He emerged from his cave
Parched and sallow
For captive he had been
Chained in place and staked
Detained within the deepest confines
Of the mines beneath the earth

There his world was of shadow
Formed from flames and ideas
Corporeal yet intangible
Dancing upon the cave wall
And within the nothing beyond
Moved the shapes and figures
That cast the shadow of his reality

Yet he was not to be contained
For a mind restrained cannot refrain
From understanding the concepts
For their forms
And the one form he had not yet found
Was called freedom

So he escaped his cave and emerged
A hero
For he had seen past the shadows of his life
And seen into the beautiful world
Beyond the constraints of base perspective
And there he found the sun

Blinded, the man stumbled
His eyes in shock from sensory overload
Freedom was bright
He thought as he stood straight
To face the new day
His first day
Free to understand a world
Without the misconceptions
That arise from the preconceptions
That define his reality

For one known to sojourn
The world becometh but a fraction
With every incremental journey
The puzzle of life clarifies
Like an uncouth window in need of cleaning
Every swipe removing a haze
That had previously clouded your vision
So that absent your cataracts
Each new destination resolved
And the beauty what lay beyond
Beckons
And as you merge into nature
Father asks you:
“Do your legs not tire little one?”
Enthusiastic you mew the contrary
You always were the contrarian
Springing away in leaps and bounds
In search of the next great adventure
Waiting around the next bend
I watch you go feeling proud of my little girl
Yelling after her:
“Daddy loves you my little traveler
Be sure to return with tales of your exploits.”
Like clockwork she returned again and again
As days became months and those to years
I began to fear the day when you no longer came
...
That day is today my baby kitten
…
And my heart aches for just one more story
From the one cat known as Sojourner

Daddy misses you so much

Across the horizon a long dark grew
Faster than a rainstorm
Out of the blue
The gloom, the doom, and pale
Countered the fading luminescence
To the point that the dawn
Was nothing but quiet reminiscence
And its sad to see
But beyond that darkness
Rests a tragedy
That is tragically tied to the suns
Departure
Bringing the day to an end
That dawns the beginning
Of...
The Solitude of the Moon

The peak seemed so far away
When I glanced upwards towards the canopy
Reliving every step of this journey
That has taken me so far from where I began
As the clouds inched closer I could feel a shift
Within the paradigm that comes with altitude
A palpable change in the way I saw the world
Now at 2000 feet above the sea
Far removed from whence my home sits
I pondered the reason for my steps
And the meaning behind the climb
Maybe it is so I could be as a king
Sitting atop the world and looking down
To the valleys that define the struggles of life
Or perhaps I am running in slow motion
Trying to outpace the memories that haunt my vision
In an attempt to regain a breath of the freedom
That responsibility had so hastily stolen
Without my consent
But as I marched the distance became inconsequential
As the birds chirped a peaceful melody
I began to hear the song of nature
And within my minds eye
Halfway up this mountain
I reached the top of my soul

The light retreated as he stepped forward from the shadows

Recoiling away like the hand from a poisonous snake

Casting the world in a semi-luminous glow of a crimson washed patina

He struck a bell seven times to announce his arrival

With every strike the sound became less pronounced; distant

Until at the end of the seventh, ghostly silence reigned supreme

As he moved the air started to sizzle, the energy overwhelming

An oppressive heat boiling the air itself into a darkened conflagration

The stench of decay followed in his footsteps, putrid and wretched

Life held its last breath begging with eyes pleading for lights return

Sadly the clock ticks
And Old Man Time
Steals another breath
As a moment is captured
Frozen in time
Locked away
Just out of arms reach
We grasp
Losing touch with a second
So powerful
As to leave us breathless
Desperate
For just one more tock
One more kiss
As we say "I do"

Beads of moisture settle at dew point
And coalesce into sparkling gems
Resting on vibrant green leaves
Resulting in an early morning menagerie
Of Christmas coated reflections
Refractive of the growing light
Into a kaleidoscope of life and nature
As drop by drop the shimmering beads fall
Down to the earth,
The start of it all

As we cruise down the unmarked path
Lost without a care
The sun on our backs
The wind in our hair
This freedom feeling
From going nowhere
But to the shores of reality;
The place where it all began
Born from the love of nature
Is our desire to share
In this goal of exploration
Where times stands still
And all the problems
Of this rolling rock
Fizzle and sizzle away
As the fires of our foundation
Sears away the tears
Brought on by the stagnation
That perpetuates the daily struggle
To survive

We are only alive
When the wilds
Are on our sides

I am an idea
But I'm just a nobody

Taken with a grain of salt
I cause you to pucker

As the electrolyte
Dehydrates
Your sense of reality
Its fabric
Ripples and waves
At my intrusion
Into the certainty
Of your world
Leaving behind ghastly
Spectres
Embattled within
A war they cannot win
Nor hope to escape
As my identity

Crushes the prominent
Ignorance

Which fears wisdom
Above all else

From Publius

To Gaius



Gaius, how long have we worked together now?



Three, four years?



Are we not as friends, whose sweat salts the soil?

Whose blood still stains mine alter?

...

And mine yours?

...

Have you forgotten your oath?

As brothers have we not sacrificed for the work?



In shared turmoil we toiled with miniscule minutias,

Always working together to make solutions

From pesty problems.

...

Yet, since you hired Marcus you have been different;

...

The work once shared has now become mine own.

No longer do you seek success in teamwork,



Nay,



Languid you have become with the work;

Heavy have mine shoulders become as a result.



Marcus is a joke.

Sure, he makes a fine comrade

Suitable for long binges of wine and women,

But his intellectual capacity is found wanting.

...

A detriment to getting the job done.

...

Still, you insist upon toting him around,

Holding his hand like a little lost puppy

Whose eyes water with weeping greed,

For more and more favoritism and need.

While, I, sit here and continue the work;

I am here finishing what we started, Gaius:



My SWEAT

...

My BLOOD



Has never ceased to pour forth to the land,

While you reap the harvest, leaving bare kernels

For your so called 'friend' to pick at.

...

Scraps as a reward for rearing another bountiful crop.

...

While Marcus lounges in your atrium,

******* plump figs,

...

That I have grown,

...

Spending more time in the lavatorium,

Than tilling the soil or plucking and picking.



No, dear Gaius, you can have the work.

Enjoy it with your dear Marcus.

He'd make a great Antinous to your Hadrianus.

...

Together, may the gods see you buggered in failure.

...

For this, I will make an offering of frankincense and myrrh

As I set off for new fields and greener pastures

To ply my trade.



One that you will find wanted in the days and months

To come.

...

I've new fields to plow


Seeds to sow


Crops to reap


And seedlings to grow

...

Like them, dear Gaius, I will thrive under noonday sun,

While you will wilt with your work.



Without me.



Signed,

PERTINAX

The eye that is beholden to less
Is empty and dead
Lacking the myriad pigmentation
Necessary to focus it's lens
On the target at hand
We call this eye "blind"
Unable to determine the difference
Between light and dark;
Beauty nor evil
Yet somehow it manages to feel...
To allow it's owner to gaze upon infinity
And understand that there is no "know"
Only the "why" that motivates greatness
Within the soul that eye can see
All the answers to the world
Lack corporeal reality

Time may stop
But it is those moments of life
Where beauty best sees fit to rest its head
Upon shoulders of iron will that refuse to bow
A strength beholden to one shared amongst the many
A light in the dark soul of a world gone mad
That shatters the sad heart born of a passing
Into a better state
One that knows no fear lest time resume
Its ever marching trek down the flowery gardens
To which experience paves a road of gold
Not diminished by its steady crossing
But improved for having been graced with such resolve
In that every stone demarcates a moment
Where time has slowed and reflections
Shine bright those calm moments of quiet serenity
Whose mother is peace omnipresent
Born from the passion of each step
Where every recollection recalls a story
Best told by those who shared in times gambit
Knowing that even at the end of one path
Time will stop and give birth to a highway of love
Lined with memories of you.

This is immortality

It's in the quiet moments that we dwell
Kneeling from the weight of countless burdens
Imagining atlas as he stood proud after shrugging
Thinking and gathering the courage necessary
To do what is required regardless of the strain
We heave in determined concentration
At first making no discernible impact until...
Progress and a shift in consciousness as peace
Begins to peak over a distant horizon
Silhouetting our boulders in stark contrast
To the warmth and radiance of contentment
And with one final push we shrug our burdens
Catching them in waiting opened hands
For we realized through the trials of atlas
That his mistake was dropping his weight
Instead of accepting responsibility for his actions

Recently I realized
There is a fine line
Between good and evil
Take someone like me
Philosopher, poet, prophet
Whose journey through life
Has been wrought between
Heaven and hell
Always seeing the good
And trying to be better
Only to be met with disdain
That has alienated the best of me
To a small pinprick
Barely a memory
Of the potential I once had
Now in its place rests hate;
Scorn for all those
Who have made me what I am
An evil tyrant
Absent love
=================================
I will make this country tremble
You will not deny another their light
As I train my sights on your authority
Dead because you took my rights

Minds claim to know that which is not.
Foundations... they are broken and they rot.
From the rubble is found a truth stronger than life;
To understand that knowing is nothing but
Standing on our understanding.
Now we 'K'now

Minds claim to know that which is not.
Foundations... they are broken and they rot.
From the rubble is found a truth stronger than life;
To understand that knowing is nothing but
Standing on our understanding.
Now we 'K'now