* * * * * *
I drove a chariot for Egypt’s dead gods,
obeyed decrees of an angry Pharaoh.
Vision widens where hope seems to narrow
as coral crusts the rims and axle-rods.
Submerged upon the sands my army’s host;
Erythrean currents their secrets keep.
The waters gave way, drowned me in the deep
while God led you forth toward your promised coast.
There was no choice for me, the charioteer.
A tyrant sent me forth to hunt you down;
pursuing you, I thought your end was near.
In the descent, I lost my star and crown.
My lord was false, while yours continues strong…
I rise from depths to further you along.

This night as I lay upon a smoky stone
Seven lines I say, my mantras own.
Adrift in the sky as my prayers atone,
Im alive here, now in the astral zone.

As fear becomes strength my nemesis fell
Tempting my faith, *** heiress, my grail.
Her face became snake like, her skin turning pale,
A wraith to be slaughtered, lust could not prevail.

With powers of godlike capacity,
I take flight over towers immensity.
Propelling me forward, towards destiny,
My unlimmited source of ecstasy.

Beyond what is light, I could never know
Blinded by fright, moralities throne.
Duality is as simple a god can be shown,
For man is both astral, still birthed from stone.

{ impasse }

Non action –again
Under a dim sun
I read the world

and miss the encounter

Di nuovo inazione
Al sole fioco di lucerne
leggo il mondo

–e non t'incontro

Maybe they are right,
after all.

That I am
cold,
distant,
self absorbed,
off in my own world,
will not deign to come down.

I have been
shaped and marred,
scarred
by forces beyond my control,
so forgive me
if I seem a little

off.

Believe me, I have tried
to change my nature –
tried to be warmer, more attentive, more involved,
but I can’t seem to help
who I am -
always off in some state of
dissociation,
never can be bothered
with reality.

Yet
if I am so cold,
why does the ocean
reach to kiss me
unbidden?

What is this pull
I seem to exert
without even trying?

I keep my distance,
keep my secrets,
my insanity
buried under scabs
of ice and rock.
If I am a liar
because of it,
so be it.

Call me what you will,
your life revolves around mine.

But what is even enough for you*, you ask
As if I shut myself
in the highest room of the Tower
on purpose;
who would do that?
I am no
Dorothy.
If I throw my body
over the railing, I
have no idea what
will happen.

It would probably
just break my skull
if you don’t
catch me
down
there.

I am no architect, but
I dream big.
I’d been out in the cold so long -
who could blame a bit of desperation?
All I ever wanted was a home,
some scrap of safety, security.

I thought I could find home
in another person,
so I built a tower
out of possibility,
out of every bit of desire
salvaged from all the old wreck sites.

My bricks were your
attention and love,
my glue was my hope.

I had the foundation in place overnight.

-

I built but
you helped,
encouraged me,
made me think
that I could do this,
that we could do this.

We built the tower together.

-

you are my idea of home,
you wrote to me once,
and I believed you,
thought words and intentions
could be as strong as bricks,
would glue us together.

I am no architect, but
this time I was sure
that the foundations were strong,
that desire could translate to permanence.

But I ignored the cracks,
thought they’d seal themselves
on their own.

I dream big,
but my foundations
were shaky,
made out of finite temperamental material
that crumbles to dust
when disaster strikes.

-

Disaster struck,
and once again
I was out in the cold,
left to the elements.
Silences are as devastating
as earthquakes,
and my tower turned brittle,
crumbled around me.

There is no safety in towers

If you fly too close to the sun
you might get burned.

Me?

I saw my chance
stretched out before me
and I jumped,
discovered I could fly.

Me?

I picked the sun,
paid the price
for the high.

-

I have known
darkness.

And yet
every time
I plunge
down,
        down,
            down,

it’s always the same
Shock,
and pain.

Oh God,
the pain.

-

Deep in the dark,
I curse the day
I ever saw the sun.

Better, instead,
to have been born a mole,
content to spend my life
snuffling about in the soil.

Deep in the dark,
licking my wounds,
I am certain that this
is the end.

-

Good bye to
trust,
to love,
to warmth.

Good bye.

-

How could this have happened?
I cry out to myself,
but when the tears dry
I remember.

Remember how
I am addicted to risk,
addicted to the extremes of feeling -
anything to escape
the Nothingness.

I always seem to be courting
the ones that carry concealed weapons
they don’t know how to wield.

And, me?

I am the perfect target.

-

I figure I deserve this,
and so
I make rock bottom my home,
try to get used to the dark,
try throw a cloak over
the light I've known
try to bury it deep underground.

-

I dig and dig and dig.
My blood goes cold,
I hibernate.

-

I hibernate
until one day
I find I can move.

My limbs work,
I am not as broken
as I thought.

-

I am cold,
I miss the sun.

-

So I shake off sleep,
and pack up my things.

I am not a worm,
not a mole.
Dark
was never meant to be
my home.

I turn
all the swords in my back
into a ladder
and I haul myself up.

-

Back on solid ground,
I begin to warm up.

Oh Death,
you my favorite card,
you my wildest courtship,
you who broke me open,
coaxed me into spilling my secrets,
and now,
you are gone,
leaving wreckage behind.

But wreckage is not
annihilation.

Oh Death,
you paved the way
for things I never thought possible,
razed the worst to the ground,
without even knowing.
I can feel the seeds of something
new and good
spring up within me.

Oh Death,
I don’t want to die.

They strung me up.
Not by the neck,
that would be
too quick.

No.
They intended
a slow torture for me,
bound one foot,
bound my arms.

I heard a voice:
Escape is possible
if you want it.

And I was alone.

At first I struggled.
Swayed back and forth
from the wind, and the weather and the
pain,
to no avail.

But eventually,
I learnt to just

Stop.

If this was my life,
So be it.
I was not going to provide
a show of my misery
to any God.

I saved my energy,
learnt to live with seeing the world
pass me by,
learnt to see things
from a different perspective.

Torture?
This was nice,
relaxing even,
I could hardly feel the pain,
could block it out
almost entirely.

Perhaps this is what I wanted
all along -
an eternal break.

Fool that I was,
I failed to realize
the torture was not physical
but mental.

Slowly I grew bored
in contemplation,
in limbo,
in apathy,
in atrophy.

I remembered the voice:
escape is possible,
I remembered
everything I wanted to do
everything I still yearned to do.

All the beauty and the goodness
and the possibilities of Life
made me ache,
and I could not block it out.

Suddenly I saw:
this was not torture
but a test.

My time of suspension is up,
These are but ropes,
not chains.

I know the way out,
and I am not afraid.

There is work to be done.