How does one romanticize
a love completely digitalized?
Hands never held,
but grasping nevertheless.

It'd be a lie to say I never lied
but you, you used me
to fantasize about a life
you wished you possessed.

How many sunrises spent me?
Never in reality...
It was almost midnight
at my place

as you spoke to me of high IQs
and all the girls that loved you,
and how you wished I
wasn't so far away.

I was on a train to your country.
Although it'd been years, I thought you'd see me
We spoke on the phone
when I got there.

You said that you were "so busy"
I laughed and asked you, "seriously?"
our friends said,
"it's not just you, we swear."

I waited for you at the beach.
A group of us, looking at the sea,
then I felt something sprinkle
on my head.

Above me you were, familiar sight
I pursed my smile with all my might.
I wanted to run to you
but I waved instead.

We walked together out to the cliff
I asked to go farther, you weren't interested,
so I walked to the edge
by myself.

Looking out there at the bay
you grew up near, how strange?
I am here without
your help...

Two years later, I'm back again
It's a long story, involving my friends.
I have no hopes of seeing you
this time.

I have a little life here, there's places I go.
Things are familiar, people I know.
And you don't even cross my mind.

Then we all ended up
drinking and dancing at a club
when I saw your name
in yellow neon.

Tunnel vision closed in on the sign.
What is a love I can feel that's not mine?
I felt stuck,
though I'm the free one.

It wasn't real, all you said wasn't true
I loved a you that's not really you.
I suppose I should be grateful
you kept him from me.

And no matter how much I wish it away,
I still wish I could meet him someday.
Not you, not now,
someone different completely.

I wandered back out to the cliff
In my mind I thought it so dangerous.
Why do we make things bigger
than they are in real life?

My imagination built mountains.
It built a house that we lived in.
It's abandoned now,
but I still stop by.

This was once a sanctuary,
a place where the world was your stories.
Truth was whatever
you decided to show.

And now you're off in reality
I wonder if you tell them about me.
I know a you
they'll never know.

The endurance

Locked away in millennial slumber

We dreamed again of the glorious days

In golden halls of apotheosis.

The conqueror shall return the old ways,

And they shall kneel and sing the songs of praise.



All hail the first emperor

Of the great empire that would never fall!

Exalted among men, long may he reign.

We who on wintry mountains once stood tall,

‘Neath the earth now, humbly await his call.



The intruder

For centuries, we stood still in silence.

Curtains of darkness were the only light,

Behind the shut gates of the mausoleum.

Sealed in the abyss, not a soul in sight-

One strange voice rides on lonesome winds at night.



Silhouette of a stranger on the wall

Brings forth a light that would perish all.

Eyes on the throne of our supreme lord,

He sees not of the shadows of his steps.

Come forward, stranger who shall meet our swords.



Lied forgotten, but we will not forget.

We are the guardians of the emperor,

On war chariots, in both life and death.

Tread lightly, trespasser, to where you enter,

For this journey you should not have ventured.  



Hark now, careless wanderer, eyes greed-blinded,

Who seeks to steal the treasures of our prime,

And slither away from our anger,

Thief, you have awaken the dragon’s sleep,

You have reached the point of no turning back.



You have brought corruption to the holy place.

Our master stirs, and commands us in rage.

We shall stop at nothing to cast his vengeance

Upon foul men and free him from his cage.

Witness the destruction and dawn of the new age.



The ascension

The intruder lies quietly on the ground.

From the ancient times, foes who crossed his path,

We promised to leave none of them unscathed.

He who commits this unforgiving crime,

Is bound to taste the dragon’s wrath.



Do not look into the abyss,

Or may the abyss look back at you.

We once rose as a great empire of might,

Now we rest under the light.

We shall rest no more, and linger no more.



Rise, Legion of the afterlife!

Rise.



We have waited.

We have weathered.

We have endured.

We have slept.

We have dreamt.

We have awaken.

I walk my life, a subway station
Where dirt consorts
The air around.
It pounds my nape,
It flames my mind
With sights and fates
And sounds.

Above, a tram goes up the alley
Tinged with canary hue.
Below, my wit:
What void, what valley:
It sank, in Tagus mused.

I take a seat, doors screech behind.
O, what wondrous whiffs?
Of metal beams
Attriting loudly
Against metal wheels?

To a halt it cuts my chain of thought,
Rivals my dream, they brawl.
'Tis from the gallery
Of broken hope
The beggar man crawls.

Intemperate horns his entry announce,
Dysphoric scenes aground.
He comes detuned
Near clears his throat,
Lethargic voice resounds:

I beat my cane
In wrongful rhythm,
'Cause wrongful
Was my life.
My voice hurts from
All this singing:
'Twas morphed into
A sigh.
I longed, I longed
For all my sinning
Was ought to be repaid.
Deserved so much,
God took my
Will, my sight,
My love, my
Name.

So tell me, vagrant,
What did He take?
-Said I-
Who has loved you?
What is your will,
What name did you go by?

I used to be a man of soul
Whose heart beat strong and dign,
I used to write
And then I died
On the 10th before July.

He took my coins for all my service
At wars:
At land
At sea
-The waves still have her,
Laying there still,
Waiting away from me!-
Said he-
I will my love,
My fire, passion
-My young Natercia!-
Most darling of all nymphaea!

So God is just after all,
Replacing sin with grief.
No need for me
To pay the man:
God has done the deed.

The deadbeat coins of his cup
Turmoil ever so slightly.
I leave my dream,
Doors shrill again:
'Tis time to end my journey.

Jason, leader of the Argonauts
writes in his log, ‘We have come far
& yet have only found
discarded pieces of her garment
floating on the current as if leading
us on to her lavender abyss;
Asclepius, much like Hart Crane
gaily diving off the side of the ship
fishes her sandal from the waters;

Asclepius sniffing the well worn footwear;
his healing eyes ignite,
‘These surely were worn by the Goddess;
Her foot-odor is all over them’,
the divine doctor says
Stroking the abandoned enchanted instep

Heracles wonders if this is a sign
Or if the doctor simply has a shoe fetish;
Tiresias telling the strongman that
Every fetish has its purpose &
this will reveal the direction her steps have
taken & that it was Prometheus himself
Who gave sheer lingerie to women
To catch the scent & hold men spellbound

After some basic Homeric
conversational one-upmanship
& Socratic back-and-forth,
Tiresias succeeds in convincing Heracles
of the rightness of drooling
Dr. Asclepius’s perverted actions;

The Argonauts are destined for success
By decree of Zeus, father of the gods;  
Calliope, a giant who blows the clouds
into shapes & makes the four winds
sing like a boy band; can become
human size whenever she desires
& ****** mortal men w/ her song

I would think right there on the temple floor
on mats softer than any fur,
We are destined to spend 40 nights
as captives of her furious wrestling tiger-women
whose roar is so loud the sound roils
through the vined jungle and across the tops
of the darkest trees and every living
creature goes into a heat and goes to ground
To mate driven lustily insane by
the unearthly screams,
and just then growls rang out


Her blood boiling hot,
No one had ever come so near,
it was as if a fight to the death was on,
but no death seemed clear


Of all the heroes on the Argos
Only one truly worried; Calliope's
own son would have to endure
witnessing yet again his mother
****** his shipmates; the muse
of epic poetry inspiring love visions
in their heads, meaning Orpheus,
greatest poet & musician
of the ancient world would have to yet
again wield the eternally
perfectly tuned lyre given him
by his muse-mother's master,
sun god Apollo for just this cause;

Another painful reminder that his mother
was a **** who molested him
when he was but a singing child;
she had taught him the ways
of poetry & music but
at the price of his sympathy & as if
embracing the death of love, it would
be Orpheus' task to yet
again bewitch his own mother

Intrigued, Calliope bursting mortal
chains asunder grows into who knows how tall
Only to dissolve from sight
into a swarm of sea creatures;
Calliope, beloved mother of Orpheus
casting bones as the ship goes over the edge of the world;

As if from two separate points of view
the hero embarks on his Quest for the majestic crone,
Only to find his ship navigating through
Amazon territory (so Freudian, so Jungian)
where he searches for the temple of the mythic mystic female;

Every legendary goddess has heard of him
From still-more ancient legends
known only to them; the hero whose name
is as yet unknown goes to the prow of his ship,
at long last seeing her white mountains
& following her thunder

By Medusa & Johnny Noir