Ridding the Dark Shadows that lie,
Deep adumbrations of the past;
That lurk within close quarters
Is an ever present cynical task.
By this, I mean, the scoundrels will always be near.
But not to live within us, nor to cause us fear.
Their presence simply affirms that we're living in the light;
Because Shadows are never visible in the dark of night.

The air is brittle this ominous, wintry night.

The slivers of a life you used to know still haunt you, as surely as you have permitted them to be a haunt to others.

Without question, it is those memories that spur your ruminations; that cause your copious circumlocutions; which compell you to stand on this somber boulevard in front of this crumbling, but once stately manor that now is a languid presence with the solitary purpose of looming over the vast grounds.

It is obligatory that you proceed along the avenue that used to split the yards that are now overgrown and chocoblock with twisted vines, and thistles.

You pause, to gather your strength.
One deep inhailation and then you hold your breath as you grip the tarnished handle and lock leaver.

With a perfect degree of strength your thumb recalls, the mechanism is undone.

Your arm pushes forward.

The silence is disturbed by a warbling creak as the heavy door is slowly opened.

You exhale, then before you lose your nerve you quickly pass through the ingress and enter into the foyer,
which is instantly familiar in the dim, flickering light and the long, slender adumbrations effected by the gossamer encaked voltives jutting from the dusty walls.

Though it has remaned unchanged  
throughout all the time that has passed, standing in the ornate room affirms that the warmth with which you used to be recieved here has been abandoned to a frigidity.

You feel as if this room remembers you.

This is as far as I dare go with you, my friend, though I know you must continue.

I have listened to your stories, so
I know you have many rooms to search.

The closier that you seek is in a matter that is not my own.

I will depart upon rendering these words of warning:

When visiting the past,

As you daringly explore these often haralded halways,
Be careful what you leave behind.
Take caution not to lose yourself,
For a shadow lingers in the Suite Sublime.

I can circumvent your systems.
I can infiltrate your ranks.
I can pass inside the shadows
Quietly along your river banks.

Only in the shadows can you find me.
Come on in and see what you will find
In the places I have slithered into,
The darkest, cob-webbed courners of your mind.

As I sat by the window sill
Decked in grey garb
Listening  to adumbrations
And other grey garbage,
My eyes were drawn beyond the room,
Out across an odd sea of serrated roofs
Till I saw,
On a sandy patch of land
Ten boys and a ball.

I sat between my passion and my profession,
Peering out the window of my profession.
I watched engrossed, my passion
Bib around my neck,
Boots upon their feet.

“LD/HCR/.... “
The court clerk cried.

I profess passion for another profession,
I’m not a professional at my passion,
But I can profess my profession passionately!
And so I rise...
“May it please this honourable court...”

And it was ******.

it's the caffeine making dark crescents undereye
not some divine enlightenment
(there might be a dash of soul-searching though)
low, glazed limbs are frozen still

a frosted flurry of flakes falls
relieving my concentration
returning me to the road
to the pale glow of white snow
silhouetting the bare oak grove
hefty adumbrations emerging
charcoal on unblemished canvas

"Harden your heart, grow up"
"Harden your heart, grow up"
I repeat over and over
click
I get a different result
Real insanity would be conversing to myself, not chanting: pshaw!

My insides now cold as ice
open windows, abrasive breeze

I don't have a seat warmer

don't need one when everything's the same temp
I've hardened my heart, my groovy slouch recedes
jaw set and stiffened
Sufjan and Novo Amor siphoning my hope
tears become stalactites

"I have loved you for the last time"
pulling me back into colorless pensiveness
matching the steadfast sentinels blurring by

Methinks hmm, perhaps
I admittedly self plagiarize and quite aware
aforementioned amalgamated, conglomerated,
fabricated, jerry rigged, and organized
eye gripping titled
poem already aired a year plus ago,
though revisiting said theme
downplayed now as thoughts blare,

though similarly filched content
(pertaining to other literary endeavors)
invariably glommed electronically
(digitally remastered and remixed),
nevertheless gobbledygook enigmatically
jerkily, and quirkily communicated,
sans trademark Pi Seine (seen) fishtail career
as applies to uber secreted questions.

This chap challenges himself,
an immense task I dare
unleash unbounded kickstarting euphoria
within psychic calm and weal
with a healthy dose of logorrhea
scowl unintentionally anonymous reader
mine re: noun verbosity doth ensnare
though oft times obfuscation veils merely

a black hole sun (son) prominence
asthma faux eminence amber gris
long ago didst flare
aware if chance encounter
in a dark alley coal less sing
burning eyes fiercely glare
yet, an explanation
would be proffered to hear.

Most instances when I initially seat
myself priming creative literary juices to flow,
an unspecified number hours elapse
before that eureka i.e. Jackie Oh
NASA hiss (Onassis) revelation transpires
witnessing, this scruffy, prickly, grow
tusk long haired woolly creature
out malm mouth drool dripping
trademark characteristic viz
pencil neck geek
madly scratching itchy hairs

dotting chinny chin chin of
garden variety generic hobo
hook huns hitters hymns elf
tubby frank and ernest poet;
home body (nowhere man);
beetle browed fool on the hill;
common everyday fluky,
nippy, nap noopy common Joe,
just biden his time,
whence upon gestation ova hen chic idea
comes home to stir the roost.

(Hard boiled eggheads merely
scrambled random thought fragments
at that stage) scrunching brow
activates laser focus,
a scattershot burst
of tangential threads populate
formerly barren tabula rasa,
sans, Lenovo external screen
once again defying (tomb me
akin to some eternal mystery),

trucked since time immemorial
inexplicable, that sudden ignition
asper cerebral automatic
catalytic converter kickstarter
(hmm...perhaps cogs and gears
housed within medulla oblongata)
foster fecund fertilization,
an inexplicable phenomena, I dune hot know
explanation, but upon advent
whence, wispy vague undefinable inchoate

coalesce analogous to genesis of animal new life
when there appears just the merest hint
of fledgling wispy notions strive similar
to ***** cells fervently whipsawing vis a vis,
via flagellation motility misfits
and false starts before this crotchety scribe
mollycoddles crux of embryonic idea
congeals, expresses, and forms
grandiose manifest destiny
mentioned above i.e. ***

Lee Judas Priest remaining catharsis
seems like a versatile
self determining Motorhead
(ace of spades) tour de force,
whereat fingers of the left hand
move of their own volition spilling forth poe
whet tree once expanded Leaves (of Grass)
finds me Waltzing Whitman nigh hick cull
tickled pink with a soft after glow.

This penchant spurring confabulation
explaining (feebly) zest
yours truly experiences
expatiating honest to dog ness
figuratively go win west
hoard (word) ** seeking
mine own mother lode acquired,
via verse a tile material undergoing
electric kool aid acid test
incorporating rigorous (mortise
and tenon constructed) adverbial quest
which wondrous, whirled,

and webbed woven semicolon aided nest
reinforced with double entendre
tongue in cheek jest,
whereby multiple interpretations
(ala mode literary splotchy Rorschach test)
tenants in common beau geste
ma bell heavable own home spun faux
Cambridge Analytica
Jimmy Crack corn and I don't care
gimcrackery defaced facebook best
bite, with absolute zero
data snatched aye evasively attest.

Methinks hmm, perhaps
aforementioned conglomerated eye gripping titled,
poem already aired
though revisiting said theme
downplayed as thoughts blare
though similar content
invariably communicated,
sans trademark Pi Seine fishtail career
as applies to other questions.

This chap asks himself,
an immense task I dare
unleash unbounded kickstarting euphoria
within psychic calm and weal
with a healthy dose of logorrhea
scowl unintentionally reader
mine re: noun verbosity doth ensnare
though oft times obfuscation veils merely

a black hole sun (son) prominence
asthma faux eminence amber gris
long ago didst flare
aware if chance encounter
in a dark alley coal less sing
burning eyes fiercely glare
yet, an explanation
would be proffered to hear.

Most instances when I initially seat
myself priming creative literary juices to flow,
an unspecified number hours elapse
before that eureka i.e. Jackie Oh
NASA hiss revelation transpires
witnessing, this scruffy, prickly,
and madly scratching itchy hairs
dotting chinny chin chin of this hobo

hook huns hitters hymns elf
tubby a generic home
er run (hitting) mill
(on the floss sing false teeth)
common everyday fluky,
nippy, nap noopy common Joe,
just biden his time,
whence upon gestation ova hen chic idea

(Hard boiled eggheads merely
scrambled random thought fragments
at that stage) scrunching brow
activates laser focus,
a scattershot burst
of tangential thread populate
formerly barren tabula rasa,
sans, Lenovo external screen
once again defying (tomb me
akin to some eternal mystery),
trucked since time immemorial

inexplicable, that sudden ignition
asper cerebral automatic
catalytic converter kickstarter
(hmm...perhaps cogs and gears
housed within medulla oblongata)
foster fecund fertilization,
an inexplicable phenomena, I dune hot know
explanation, but upon advent
whence, wispy vague undefinable inchoate

coalesce analogous to genesis of animal new life
when there appears just the merest hint
of fledgling wispy notions strive similar
to ***** cells fervently whipsawing vis a vis,
via flagellation motility misfits
and false starts before this crotchety scribe
mollycoddles crux of embryonic idea
congeals, expresses, and forms
grandiose manifest destiny
mentioned above i.e. **
Lee Judas Priest remaining catharsis
seems like a versatile

self determining Motorhead tour de force,
whereat fingers of the left hand
move of their own volition spilling forth poe
whet tree once expanded leaves (of grass)
finds me Waltzing whitman nigh hick cull
tickled pink with a soft after glow.

This penchant spurring confabulation
explaining (feebly) zest
yours truly experiences
expatiating honest to dog ness
figuratively go win west
hoard ** seeking
mine own mother lode acquired,
via verse a tile material undergoing
electric kool aid acid test
incorporating rigorous (mortise
and tenon constructed) adverbial quest
which wondrous, whirled,

and webbed woven semicolon aided nest
reinforced with double entendre
tongue in cheek jest,
whereby multiple interpretations
(ala mode literary splotchy Rorschach test)
tenants in common beau geste
ma own home spun faux
Cambridge Analytica
Jimmy Crack corn and I don't care
gimcrackery defaced facebook best
bite, with absolute zero
data snatched aye evasively attest.

laughter and smiling
faces of friends,
adumbrations that
reveal my loneliness.
speak up, tortured soul.