XXXIII

Yes, call me by my pet-name! let me hear
The name I used to run at, when a child,
From innocent play, and leave the cowslips piled,
To glance up in some face that proved me dear
With the look of its eyes. I miss the clear
Fond voices which, being drawn and reconciled
Into the music of Heaven’s undefiled,
Call me no longer. Silence on the bier,
While I call God—call God!—So let thy mouth
Be heir to those who are now exanimate.
Gather the north flowers to complete the south,
And catch the early love up in the late.
Yes, call me by that name,—and I, in truth,
With the same heart, will answer and not wait.

A claypot,
brittle and empty.
Cold and weary.

For I,
was that claypot.
Brittle and empty,
Cold and weary.

My exanimate body,
quiet like the winter
but piercing like the howling wind.

You picked me up,
and painted me with colours.
Colours,
that represented your love.

Blue for freedom,
Yellow for loyalty,
Brown for humility.
And Red - your love.

You embraced me,
and kissed me,
despite the coldness of my touch.
You painted me with your love.
I,
believed that I was now something.

And..
You dropped me.

Take me to the lamppost
Where my heart goes to gleam

Replace the fire with the spark from the sea
See the way she radiates back at me

Take me to the lamppost
Where the light has dimmed

See what once stood bright and constant
now holding only things that became dark and exanimate

Take me to the lamppost
Where memories of the light

Try to hold on best they can
Though loss is drying, blurred in the mute sand

Take me to the lamppost
To what once was gold and blazen

Remind me of what used to be
Fire kindled through glass; and see!

Take me to the lamppost
Where I yearn to see the light

That was once within.

comes what of this:

          pink exhaustion
             ?
some shallow tract of nicks
neck scratched clean
& puddles of symmetry
line the frame still

           breathe flexing tiny
freckles shoulder wrought silk;
(a chalice so well tuned. blood song
   symphony)

repose exanimate former pleasure cutter

          you

fulfilled but lifeless
neglected, and discontinued
they move closer to the ruptured but flawless,
gratified but exanimate
cherished and continued
life within the forest, the life surrounded by a stronghold of bark

a slight crunch of the wooden skinned   debris,
fulfilled but deceased
abandoned and transforming into something very similar to
their pacing which was not to be heard by any intellectual life nearby,
as the skeletons walked around the tree.