and I woke from a dream
as fading clouds float downstream
and collect like leaves at the mouth
of the sea, children of the spring
monsoons, but today merely a wave
I see all this from my perch
high above the main, rolling to and fro
on Mother's breath, her every sigh
gives us motion, portends danger
leaning her shoulder on rocky cliffs
and I woke from a dream
to a screaming train car
gripping the tracks, gobbling human snacks
and spitting them back out on the streets
passing signs that press for cash
as goblin laughs mock and sneer
from the fleeting recesses, off limits
to civilian souls, just one more stop to go
and I woke from a dream
with bare feet on cool tile
water drops pooling in low spots of grout
and steam collecting in the corners
while dawn peeks through thawed out
windows, a dim promise of the heat of day
shaking the dew from my eyes I see
in the mirror haze, strange reflections,
unfamiliar through a glass roof sky
cursing screaming questions why
and I woke from a dream
and I finally woke free
in your arms, far from dark seas
and subway dreams and prophesies
clawing sleep like an attacker
wrestling sheets and memories
and welcoming the day to ponder
what these visions foretell, left to
wonder the vast expanse of mind
fumbling for a pen to try
and I woke from a dream

You said we've all got cracks and blemishes
wrinkles in our character
the little crevices where the past is hidden
where the fear settles as a dust,
nibbling away at a fragile foundation

It's this Modern Age I said,
kids in the automaton state
profit slaves desperate to break their screens
and return to the fields
rise and set with the sun
like in the ancient golden seasons

But you smiled, it has always been so
men with eyes glazed recalling days long gone
when the real work was done
when love was grand and the food were rich
Roman hearts pining for halcyon Greek nights

Then we are born crooked it seems
fresh but weathered like newborn lava
set under pressure, too old for our years
just clumsy instruments
put to task in a china shop
every stumble a chip in our innocence

And in there lies our radiance you beamed
with every glass shattered, a million gems by accident
refracting light on an imperfect world
every hasty breath a powerful wind
destined for great heights

I sent my soul to walking
down barren wastes of land
housing nothing but garbage rats
and all the worst kinds of people
where conversation was bleak and simple
and hopeless dreams were last week's
lottery tickets, scattered and forgotten
in the ditches along empty bottles

So I sent my soul to diving
lower than light cares to go
so low that thoughts weigh tons
and past plans sink into canyons
forever lost in cold chambers
where ***** and eels munch on
ancient bones from a world away
never knowing of the sun above them

So I sent my soul to flying
dodging lightning, seeking craving
and reaching but the outskirts of heaven
desperate for love, but finding only
hostile bodies hurled down paths
with no beginning and no care
for earthly truths and happy endings
holy indifferent to joy and pain

So I sent my soul to writing
to wallow in the mud and shame
to sift among the shadows for a song
or simply a voice alone
to sing and weep along with me
never to see the dawn, a few
scratches on a page and nothing more
a single soul sent wandering far

This letter was not meant for you
it was meant for me with you
to that crystalline time when we were two
before the shattering was through.

The mornings in 
when we lay oblivious to the shuffle and the city din
when the weight of the world was still 
not enough to budge us a single inch 
from between the linens.

So I recollect
all the fragments I thought I left
I'm not one to dwell but what else
is left for the lonely boy at the bottom of a well?

But now there are three
There's you and there's me
and there's who we could've been
And I've not spoken to him yet
as I'm not sure this specter is real
Or maybe I'm afraid to ask if he once half-lived,
was he thrown from the wheel
and tossed down the well here with you and them?

But I've fooled myself again
What I saw as a window
was only a mirror that needed mending
And what I heard as your voice
was always the wind
hurling back at me my own laments.

Beauty brutally murdered my captain
One touch, and the crew deserted
a hasty mutiny to an unknown island
Where I before with calm weathered
the waves, now the torrent upends
the bow, wrecked upon rocks
that could've been havens.

So I'm thrown from the sea to the sands
Left alive by a wiser hand than
I, doomed to make beach castles, just a man
mending the grains, seeing the slate
wiped clean again and again
forever banned from the mountain
and the densely wooded lands.

One day I'll abandon my post
cut short my careful tending
and set off from the coast
Leave behind the crooked lines
and SOS signs, the feeble moats
Face the interior, each step deep down
and further down into the jungle dark
and every fear the most
Hope beyond all Hope that all I own is Hope
and one day reach the sun, then I'll know.

And what keeps me shuffling through the dark?
The thought of you shuffling too
alone and apart
Not the thought that our end
will be as our start
but that the art
of the whole **** thing
is all we are.

Far into the night I wandered
over vast age and distance
before time or names
through dense shadow thickets
across wide black waters
to the edge of an infinite sea
In my palm, a pebble
which I skipped along the surface
disturbing the dark glass
I heard a thousand voices
saw a thousand faces
and lived a thousand lives
all in a moment
I knew yellow
I knew cinnamon
I know fear and love
and I found you
and I found many others
but you I found again and again
over countless lives
I found and lost you
a thousand times
the melody rolling
outward forever and on
the stone and the sea
the world in a song

Standing on the precipice
the people dance and sing
tip and toe along the razor's edge
not knowing what the day will bring

Finding comfort in the company we keep,
how brief the fleeting guarantees
from silver spoons like babes we feed
It'll take the doomsday bell to wake you from your sleep

And all we hold in our hearts as dear
we must secure by our own means
In no other man's hands rests your care
so when the hammer falls, prepare! prepare!

Your withered fingers feebly grasp
what's left of grandeur long since past
why do you cling to the status quo?
abandon your canon! forget what you know!

With humble heart and honest hands
carry the torch that holds the flame,
illuminates the darkened path
and points the way to start again

What countless numbers choose the road,
clamor for their place in line,
deaf to warning tones sustained
stretching across time,
it's the doomsday bell that's ringing
so when the hammer starts swinging where will you be?