O Sovereign power of love! O grief! O balm!
All records, saving thine, come cool, and calm,
And shadowy, through the mist of passed years:
For others, good or bad, hatred and tears
Have become indolent; but touching thine,
One sigh doth echo, one poor sob doth pine,
One kiss brings honey-dew from buried days.
The woes of Troy, towers smothering o'er their blaze,
Stiff-holden shields, far-piercing spears, keen blades,
Struggling, and blood, and shrieks--all dimly fades
Into some backward corner of the brain;
Yet, in our very souls, we feel amain
The close of Troilus and Cressid sweet.
Hence, pageant history! hence, gilded cheat!
Swart planet in the universe of deeds!
Wide sea, that one continuous murmur breeds
Along the pebbled shore of memory!
Many old rotten-timber'd boats there be
Upon thy vaporous *****, magnified
To goodly vessels; many a sail of pride,
And golden keel'd, is left unlaunch'd and dry.
But wherefore this? What care, though owl did fly
About the great Athenian admiral's mast?
What care, though striding Alexander past
The Indus with his Macedonian numbers?
Though old Ulysses tortured from his slumbers
The glutted Cyclops, what care?--Juliet leaning
Amid her window-flowers,--sighing,--weaning
Tenderly her fancy from its maiden snow,
Doth more avail than these: the silver flow
Of Hero's tears, the swoon of Imogen,
Fair Pastorella in the bandit's den,
Are things to brood on with more ardency
Than the death-day of empires. Fearfully
Must such conviction come upon his head,
Who, thus far, discontent, has dared to tread,
Without one muse's smile, or kind behest,
The path of love and poesy. But rest,
In chaffing restlessness, is yet more drear
Than to be crush'd, in striving to uprear
Love's standard on the battlements of song.
So once more days and nights aid me along,
Like legion'd soldiers.

                        Brain-sick shepherd-prince,
What promise hast thou faithful guarded since
The day of sacrifice? Or, have new sorrows
Come with the constant dawn upon thy morrows?
Alas! 'tis his old grief. For many days,
Has he been wandering in uncertain ways:
Through wilderness, and woods of mossed oaks;
Counting his woe-worn minutes, by the strokes
Of the lone woodcutter; and listening still,
Hour after hour, to each lush-leav'd rill.
Now he is sitting by a shady spring,
And elbow-deep with feverous *******
Stems the upbursting cold: a wild rose tree
Pavilions him in bloom, and he doth see
A bud which snares his fancy: lo! but now
He plucks it, dips its stalk in the water: how!
It swells, it buds, it flowers beneath his sight;
And, in the middle, there is softly pight
A golden butterfly; upon whose wings
There must be surely character'd strange things,
For with wide eye he wonders, and smiles oft.

  Lightly this little herald flew aloft,
Follow'd by glad Endymion's clasped hands:
Onward it flies. From languor's sullen bands
His limbs are loos'd, and eager, on he hies
Dazzled to trace it in the sunny skies.
It seem'd he flew, the way so easy was;
And like a new-born spirit did he pass
Through the green evening quiet in the sun,
O'er many a heath, through many a woodland dun,
Through buried paths, where sleepy twilight dreams
The summer time away. One track unseams
A wooded cleft, and, far away, the blue
Of ocean fades upon him; then, anew,
He sinks adown a solitary glen,
Where there was never sound of mortal men,
Saving, perhaps, some snow-light cadences
Melting to silence, when upon the breeze
Some holy bark let forth an anthem sweet,
To cheer itself to Delphi. Still his feet
Went swift beneath the merry-winged guide,
Until it reached a splashing fountain's side
That, near a cavern's mouth, for ever pour'd
Unto the temperate air: then high it soar'd,
And, downward, suddenly began to dip,
As if, athirst with so much toil, 'twould sip
The crystal spout-head: so it did, with touch
Most delicate, as though afraid to smutch
Even with mealy gold the waters clear.
But, at that very touch, to disappear
So fairy-quick, was strange! Bewildered,
Endymion sought around, and shook each bed
Of covert flowers in vain; and then he flung
Himself along the grass. What gentle tongue,
What whisperer disturb'd his gloomy rest?
It was a nymph uprisen to the breast
In the fountain's pebbly margin, and she stood
'**** lilies, like the youngest of the brood.
To him her dripping hand she softly kist,
And anxiously began to plait and twist
Her ringlets round her fingers, saying: "Youth!
Too long, alas, hast thou starv'd on the ruth,
The bitterness of love: too long indeed,
Seeing thou art so gentle. Could I ****
Thy soul of care, by heavens, I would offer
All the bright riches of my crystal coffer
To Amphitrite; all my clear-eyed fish,
Golden, or rainbow-sided, or purplish,
Vermilion-tail'd, or finn'd with silvery gauze;
Yea, or my veined pebble-floor, that draws
A ****** light to the deep; my grotto-sands
Tawny and gold, ooz'd slowly from far lands
By my diligent springs; my level lilies, shells,
My charming rod, my potent river spells;
Yes, every thing, even to the pearly cup
Meander gave me,--for I bubbled up
To fainting creatures in a desert wild.
But woe is me, I am but as a child
To gladden thee; and all I dare to say,
Is, that I pity thee; that on this day
I've been thy guide; that thou must wander far
In other regions, past the scanty bar
To mortal steps, before thou cans't be ta'en
From every wasting sigh, from every pain,
Into the gentle ***** of thy love.
Why it is thus, one knows in heaven above:
But, a poor Naiad, I guess not. Farewel!
I have a ditty for my hollow cell."

  Hereat, she vanished from Endymion's gaze,
Who brooded o'er the water in amaze:
The dashing fount pour'd on, and where its pool
Lay, half asleep, in grass and rushes cool,
Quick waterflies and gnats were sporting still,
And fish were dimpling, as if good nor ill
Had fallen out that hour. The wanderer,
Holding his forehead, to keep off the burr
Of smothering fancies, patiently sat down;
And, while beneath the evening's sleepy frown
Glow-worms began to trim their starry lamps,
Thus breath'd he to himself: "Whoso encamps
To take a fancied city of delight,
O what a wretch is he! and when 'tis his,
After long toil and travelling, to miss
The kernel of his hopes, how more than vile:
Yet, for him there's refreshment even in toil;
Another city doth he set about,
Free from the smallest pebble-bead of doubt
That he will seize on trickling honey-combs:
Alas, he finds them dry; and then he foams,
And onward to another city speeds.
But this is human life: the war, the deeds,
The disappointment, the anxiety,
Imagination's struggles, far and nigh,
All human; bearing in themselves this good,
That they are sill the air, the subtle food,
To make us feel existence, and to shew
How quiet death is. Where soil is men grow,
Whether to weeds or flowers; but for me,
There is no depth to strike in: I can see
Nought earthly worth my compassing; so stand
Upon a misty, jutting head of land--
Alone? No, no; and by the Orphean lute,
When mad Eurydice is listening to 't;
I'd rather stand upon this misty peak,
With not a thing to sigh for, or to seek,
But the soft shadow of my thrice-seen love,
Than be--I care not what. O meekest dove
Of heaven! O Cynthia, ten-times bright and fair!
From thy blue throne, now filling all the air,
Glance but one little beam of temper'd light
Into my *****, that the dreadful might
And tyranny of love be somewhat scar'd!
Yet do not so, sweet queen; one torment spar'd,
Would give a pang to jealous misery,
Worse than the torment's self: but rather tie
Large wings upon my shoulders, and point out
My love's far dwelling. Though the playful rout
Of Cupids shun thee, too divine art thou,
Too keen in beauty, for thy silver prow
Not to have dipp'd in love's most gentle stream.
O be propitious, nor severely deem
My madness impious; for, by all the stars
That tend thy bidding, I do think the bars
That kept my spirit in are burst--that I
Am sailing with thee through the dizzy sky!
How beautiful thou art! The world how deep!
How tremulous-dazzlingly the wheels sweep
Around their axle! Then these gleaming reins,
How lithe! When this thy chariot attains
Is airy goal, haply some bower veils
Those twilight eyes? Those eyes!--my spirit fails--
Dear goddess, help! or the wide-gaping air
Will gulph me--help!"--At this with madden'd stare,
And lifted hands, and trembling lips he stood;
Like old Deucalion mountain'd o'er the flood,
Or blind Orion hungry for the morn.
And, but from the deep cavern there was borne
A voice, he had been froze to senseless stone;
Nor sigh of his, nor plaint, nor passion'd moan
Had more been heard. Thus swell'd it forth: "Descend,
Young mountaineer! descend where alleys bend
Into the sparry hollows of the world!
Oft hast thou seen bolts of the thunder hurl'd
As from thy threshold, day by day hast been
A little lower than the chilly sheen
Of icy pinnacles, and dipp'dst thine arms
Into the deadening ether that still charms
Their marble being: now, as deep profound
As those are high, descend! He ne'er is crown'd
With immortality, who fears to follow
Where airy voices lead: so through the hollow,
The silent mysteries of earth, descend!"

  He heard but the last words, nor could contend
One moment in reflection: for he fled
Into the fearful deep, to hide his head
From the clear moon, the trees, and coming madness.

  'Twas far too strange, and wonderful for sadness;
Sharpening, by degrees, his appetite
To dive into the deepest. Dark, nor light,
The region; nor bright, nor sombre wholly,
But mingled up; a gleaming melancholy;
A dusky empire and its diadems;
One faint eternal eventide of gems.
Aye, millions sparkled on a vein of gold,
Along whose track the prince quick footsteps told,
With all its lines abrupt and angular:
Out-shooting sometimes, like a meteor-star,
Through a vast antre; then the metal woof,
Like Vulcan's rainbow, with some monstrous roof
Curves hugely: now, far in the deep abyss,
It seems an angry lightning, and doth hiss
Fancy into belief: anon it leads
Through winding passages, where sameness breeds
Vexing conceptions of some sudden change;
Whether to silver grots, or giant range
Of sapphire columns, or fantastic bridge
Athwart a flood of crystal. On a ridge
Now fareth he, that o'er the vast beneath
Towers like an ocean-cliff, and whence he seeth
A hundred waterfalls, whose voices come
But as the murmuring surge. Chilly and numb
His ***** grew, when first he, far away,
Descried an orbed diamond, set to fray
Old darkness from his throne: 'twas like the sun
Uprisen o'er chaos: and with such a stun
Came the amazement, that, absorb'd in it,
He saw not fiercer wonders--past the wit
Of any spirit to tell, but one of those
Who, when this planet's sphering time doth close,
Will be its high remembrancers: who they?
The mighty ones who have made eternal day
For Greece and England. While astonishment
With deep-drawn sighs was quieting, he went
Into a marble gallery, passing through
A mimic temple, so complete and true
In sacred custom, that he well nigh fear'd
To search it inwards, whence far off appear'd,
Through a long pillar'd vista, a fair shrine,
And, just beyond, on light tiptoe divine,
A quiver'd Dian. Stepping awfully,
The youth approach'd; oft turning his veil'd eye
Down sidelong aisles, and into niches old.
And when, more near against the marble cold
He had touch'd his forehead, he began to thread
All courts and passages, where silence dead
Rous'd by his whispering footsteps murmured faint:
And long he travers'd to and fro, to acquaint
Himself with every mystery, and awe;
Till, weary, he sat down before the maw
Of a wide outlet, fathomless and dim
To wild uncertainty and shadows grim.
There, when new wonders ceas'd to float before,
And thoughts of self came on, how crude and sore
The journey homeward to habitual self!
A mad-pursuing of the fog-born elf,
Whose flitting lantern, through rude nettle-briar,
Cheats us into a swamp, into a fire,
Into the ***** of a hated thing.

  What misery most drowningly doth sing
In lone Endymion's ear, now he has caught
The goal of consciousness? Ah, 'tis the thought,
The deadly feel of solitude: for lo!
He cannot see the heavens, nor the flow
Of rivers, nor hill-flowers running wild
In pink and purple chequer, nor, up-pil'd,
The cloudy rack slow journeying in the west,
Like herded elephants; nor felt, nor prest
Cool grass, nor tasted the fresh slumberous air;
But far from such companionship to wear
An unknown time, surcharg'd with grief, away,
Was now his lot. And must he patient stay,
Tracing fantastic figures with his spear?
"No!" exclaimed he, "why should I tarry here?"
No! loudly echoed times innumerable.
At which he straightway started, and 'gan tell
His paces back into the temple's chief;
Warming and glowing strong in the belief
Of help from Dian: so that when again
He caught her airy form, thus did he plain,
Moving more near the while. "O Haunter chaste
Of river sides, and woods, and heathy waste,
Where with thy silver bow and arrows keen
Art thou now forested? O woodland Queen,
What smoothest air thy smoother forehead woos?
Where dost thou listen to the wide halloos
Of thy disparted nymphs? Through what dark tree
Glimmers thy crescent? Wheresoe'er it be,
'Tis in the breath of heaven: thou dost taste
Freedom as none can taste it, nor dost waste
Thy loveliness in dismal elements;
But, finding in our green earth sweet contents,
There livest blissfully. Ah, if to thee
It feels Elysian, how rich to me,
An exil'd mortal, sounds its pleasant name!
Within my breast there lives a choking flame--
O let me cool it among the zephyr-boughs!
A homeward fever parches up my tongue--
O let me slake it at the running springs!
Upon my ear a noisy nothing rings--
O let me once more hear the linnet's note!
Before mine eyes thick films and shadows float--
O let me 'noint them with the heaven's light!
Dost thou now lave thy feet and ankles white?
O think how sweet to me the freshening sluice!
Dost thou now please thy thirst with berry-juice?
O think how this dry palate would rejoice!
If in soft slumber thou dost hear my voice,
Oh think how I should love a bed of flowers!--
Young goddess! let me see my native bowers!
Deliver me from this rapacious deep!"

  Thus ending loudly, as he would o'erleap
His destiny, alert he stood: but when
Obstinate silence came heavily again,
Feeling about for its old couch of space
And airy cradle, lowly bow'd his face
Desponding, o'er the marble floor's cold thrill.
But 'twas not long; for, sweeter than the rill
To its old channel, or a swollen tide
To margin sallows, were the leaves he spied,
And flowers, and wreaths, and ready myrtle crowns
Up heaping through the slab: refreshment drowns
Itself, and strives its own delights to hide--
Nor in one spot alone; the floral pride
In a long whispering birth enchanted grew
Before his footsteps; as when heav'd anew
Old ocean rolls a lengthened wave to the shore,
Down whose green back the short-liv'd foam, all ****,
Bursts gradual, with a wayward indolence.

  Increasing still in heart, and pleasant sense,
Upon his fairy journey on he hastes;
So anxious for the end, he scarcely wastes
One moment with his hand among the sweets:
Onward he goes--he stops--his ***** beats
As plainly in his ear, as the faint charm
Of which the throbs were born. This still alarm,
This sleepy music, forc'd him walk tiptoe:
For it came more softly than the east could blow
Arion's magic to the Atlantic isles;
Or than the west, made jealous by the smiles
Of thron'd Apollo, could breathe back the lyre
To seas Ionian and Tyrian.

  O did he ever live, that lonely man,
Who lov'd--and music slew not? 'Tis the pest
Of love, that fairest joys give most unrest;
That things of delicate and tenderest worth
Are swallow'd all, and made a seared dearth,
By one consuming flame: it doth immerse
And suffocate true blessings in a curse.
Half-happy, by comparison of bliss,
Is miserable. 'Twas even so with this
Dew-dropping melody, in the Carian's ear;
First heaven, then hell, and then forgotten clear,
Vanish'd in elemental passion.

  And down some swart abysm he had gone,
Had not a heavenly guide benignant led
To where thick myrt

I

There is a house with ivied walls,
And mullioned windows worn and old,
And the long dwellers in those halls
Have souls that know but sordid calls,
And dote on gold.

II

In a blazing brick and plated show
Not far away a ‘villa’ gleams,
And here a family few may know,
With book and pencil, viol and bow,
Lead inner lives of dreams.

III

The philosophic passers say,
‘See that old mansion mossed and fair,
Poetic souls therein are they:
And O that gaudy box! Away,
You ****** people there.’

"Oh yes, I went over to Edmonstoun the other day and saw Johnny, mooning around as usual! He will never make his way."
Letter of George Keats, 18--


Night falls; the great jars glow against the dark,
Dark green, dusk red, and, like a coiling snake,
Writhing eternally in smoky gyres,
Great ropes of gorgeous vapor twist and turn
Within them. So the Eastern fisherman
Saw the swart genie rise when the lead seal,
Scribbled with charms, was lifted from the jar;
And -- well, how went the tale? Like this, like this? . . .

No herbage broke the barren flats of land,
No winds dared loiter within smiling trees,
Nor were there any brooks on either hand,
Only the dry, bright sand,
Naked and golden, lay before the seas.

One boat toiled noiselessly along the deep,
The thirsty ripples dying silently
Upon its track. Far out the brown nets sweep,
And night begins to creep
Across the intolerable mirror of the sea.

Twice the nets rise, a-trail with sea-plants brown,
Distorted shells, and rocks green-mossed with slime,
Nought else. The fisher, sick at heart, kneels down;
"Prayer may appease God's frown,"
He thinks, then, kneeling, casts for the third time.

And lo! an earthen jar, bound round with brass,
Lies tangled in the cordage of his net.
About the bright waves gleam like shattered glass,
And where the sea's rim was
The sun dips, flat and red, about to set.

The prow grates on the beach. The fisherman
Stoops, tearing at the cords that bind the seal.
Shall pearls roll out, lustrous and white and wan?
Lapis? carnelian?
Unheard-of stones that make the sick mind reel

With wonder of their beauty? Rubies, then?
Green emeralds, glittering like the eyes of beasts?
Poisonous opals, good to madden men?
Gold bezants, ten and ten?
Hard, regal diamonds, like kingly feasts?

He tugged; the seal gave way. A little smoke
Curled like a feather in the darkening sky.
A blinding gush of fire burst, flamed, and broke.
A voice like a wind spoke.
Armored with light, and turbaned terribly,

A genie tramped the round earth underfoot;
His head sought out the stars, his cupped right hand
Made half the sky one darkness. He was mute.
The sun, a ripened fruit,
Drooped lower. Scarlet eddied o'er the sand.

The genie spoke: "O miserable one!
Thy prize awaits thee; come, and hug it close!
A noble crown thy draggled nets have won
For this that thou hast done.
Blessed are fools! A gift remains for those!"

His hand sought out his sword, and lightnings flared
Across the sky in one great bloom of fire.
Poised like a toppling mountain, it hung bared;
Suns that were jewels glared
Along its hilt. The air burnt like a pyre.

Once more the genie spoke: "Something I owe
To thee, thou fool, thou fool. Come, canst thou sing?
Yea? Sing then; if thy song be brave, then go
Free and released -- or no!
Find first some task, some overmastering thing
I cannot do, and find it speedily,
For if thou dost not thou shalt surely die!"

The sword whirled back. The fisherman uprose,
And if at first his voice was weak with fear
And his limbs trembled, it was but a doze,
And at the high song's close
He stood up straight. His voice rang loud and clear.


The Song.

Last night the quays were lighted;
Cressets of smoking pine
Glared o'er the roaring mariners
That drink the yellow wine.

Their song rolled to the rafters,
It struck the high stars pale,
Such worth was in their discourse,
Such wonder in their tale.

Blue borage filled the clinking cups,
The murky night grew wan,
Till one rose, crowned with laurel-leaves,
That was an outland man.

"Come, let us drink to war!" said he,
"The torch of the sacked town!
The swan's-bath and the wolf-ships,
And Harald of renown!

"Yea, while the milk was on his lips,
Before the day was born,
He took the Almayne Kaiser's head
To be his drinking-horn!

"Yea, while the down was on his chin,
Or yet his beard was grown,
He broke the gates of Micklegarth,
And stole the lion-throne!

"Drink to Harald, king of the world,
Lord of the tongue and the troth!
To the bellowing horns of Ostfriesland,
And the trumpets of the Goth!"

Their shouts rolled to the rafters,
The drink-horns crashed and rang,
And all their talk was a clangor of war,
As swords together sang!

But dimly, through the deep night,
Where stars like flowers shone,
A passionate shape came gliding --
I saw one thing alone.

I only saw my young love
Shining against the dark,
The whiteness of her raiment,
The head that bent to hark.

I only saw my young love,
Like flowers in the sun --
Her hands like waxen petals,
Where yawning poppies run.

I only felt there, chrysmal,
Against my cheek her breath,
Though all the winds were baying,
And the sky bright with Death.

Red sparks whirled up the chimney,
A hungry flaught of flame,
And a lean man from Greece arose;
Thrasyllos was his name.

"I praise all noble wines!" he cried,
"Green robes of tissue fine,
Peacocks and apes and ivory,
And Homer's sea-loud line,

"Statues and rings and carven gems,
And the wise crawling sea;
But most of all the crowns of kings,
The rule they wield thereby!

"Power, fired power, blank and bright!
A fit hilt for the hand!
The one good sword for a freeman,
While yet the cold stars stand!"

Their shouts rolled to the rafters,
The air was thick with wine.
I only knew her deep eyes,
And felt her hand in mine.

Softly as quiet water,
One finger touched my cheek;
Her face like gracious moonlight --
I might not move nor speak.

I only saw that beauty,
I only felt that form
There, in the silken darkness --
God wot my heart was warm!

Their shouts rolled to the rafters,
Another chief began;
His slit lips showed him for a ***;
He was an evil man.

"Sing to the joys of women!" he yelled,
"The hot delicious tents,
The soft couch, and the white limbs;
The air a steam of scents!"

His eyes gleamed, and he wet his lips,
The rafters shook with cheers,
As he sang of woman, who is man's slave
For all unhonored years.

"Whether the wanton laughs amain,
With one white shoulder bare,
Or in a sacked room you unbind
Some crouching maiden's hair;

"This is the only good for man,
Like spices of the South --
To see the glimmering body laid
As pasture to his mouth!

"To leave no lees within the cup,
To see and take and rend;
To lap a girl's limbs up like wine,
And laugh, knowing the end!"

Only, like low, still breathing,
I heard one voice, one word;
And hot speech poured upon my lips,
As my hands held a sword.

"Fools, thrice fools of lust!" I cried,
"Your eyes are blind to see
Eternal beauty, moving far,
More glorious than horns of war!
But though my eyes were one blind scar,
That sight is shown to me!

"You nuzzle at the ivory side,
You clasp the golden head;
Fools, fools, who chatter and sing,
You have taken the sign of a terrible thing,
You have drunk down God with your beeswing,
And broken the saints for bread!

"For God moves darkly,
In silence and in storm;
But in the body of woman
He shows one burning form.

"For God moves blindly,
In darkness and in dread;
But in the body of woman
He raises up the dead.

"Gracile and straight as birches,
Swift as the questing birds,
They fill true-lovers' drink-horns up,
Who speak not, having no words.

"Love is not delicate toying,
A slim and shimmering mesh;
It is two souls wrenched into one,
Two bodies made one flesh.

"Lust is a sprightly servant,
Gallant where wines are poured;
Love is a bitter master,
Love is an iron lord.

"Satin ease of the body,
Fattened sloth of the hands,
These and their like he will not send,
Only immortal fires to rend --
And the world's end is your journey's end,
And your stream chokes in the sands.

"Pleached calms shall not await you,
Peace you shall never find;
Nought but the living moorland
Scourged naked by the wind.

"Nought but the living moorland,
And your love's hand in yours;
The strength more sure than surety,
The mercy that endures.

"Then, though they give you to be burned,
And slay you like a stoat,
You have found the world's heart in the turn of a cheek,
Heaven in the lift of a throat.

"Although they break you on the wheel,
That stood so straight in the sun,
Behind you the trumpets split the sky,
Where the lost and furious fight goes by --
And God, our God, will have victory
When the red day is done!"

Their mirth rolled to the rafters,
They bellowed lechery;
Light as a drifting feather
My love slipped from my knee.

Within, the lights were yellow
In drowsy rooms and warm;
Without, the stabbing lightning
Shattered across the storm.

Within, the great logs crackled,
The drink-horns emptied soon;
Without, the black cloaks of the clouds
Strangled the waning moon.

My love crossed o'er the threshold --
God! but the night was murk!
I set myself against the cold,
And left them to their work.

Their shouts rolled to the rafters;
A bitterer way was mine,
And I left them in the tavern,
Drinking the yellow wine!

The last faint echoes rang along the plains,
Died, and were gone. The genie spoke: "Thy song
Serves well enough -- but yet thy task remains;
Many and rending pains
Shall torture him who dares delay too long!"

His brown face hardened to a leaden mask.
A bitter brine crusted the fisher's cheek --
"Almighty God, one thing alone I ask,
Show me a task, a task!"
The hard cup of the sky shone, gemmed and bleak.

"O love, whom I have sought by devious ways;
O hidden beauty, naked as a star;
You whose bright hair has burned across my days,
Making them lamps of praise;
O dawn-wind, breathing of Arabia!

"You have I served. Now fire has parched the vine,
And Death is on the singers and the song.
No longer are there lips to cling to mine,
And the heart wearies of wine,
And I am sick, for my desire is long.

"O love, soft-moving, delicate and tender!
In her gold house the pipe calls querulously,
They cloud with thin green silks her body slender,
They talk to her and tend her;
Come, piteous, gentle love, and set me free!"

He ceased -- and, slowly rising o'er the deep,
A faint song chimed, grew clearer, till at last
A golden horn of light began to creep
Where the dumb ripples sweep,
Making the sea one splendor where it passed.

A golden boat! The bright oars rested soon,
And the prow met the sand. The purple veils
Misting the cabin fell. Fair as the moon
When the morning comes too soon,
And all the air is silver in the dales,

A gold-robed princess stepped upon the beach.
The fisher knelt and kissed her garment's hem,
And then her lips, and strove at last for speech.
The waters lapped the reach.
"Here thy strength breaks, thy might is nought to stem!"

He cried at last. Speech shook him like a flame:
"Yea, though thou plucked the stars from out the sky,
Each lovely one would be a withered shame --
Each thou couldst find or name --
To this fire-hearted beauty!" Wearily

The genie heard. A slow smile came like dawn
Over his face. "Thy task is done!" he said.
A whirlwind roared, smoke shattered, he was gone;
And, like a sudden horn,
The moon shone clear, no longer smoked and red.

They passed into the boat. The gold oars beat
Loudly, then fainter, fainter, till at last
Only the quiet waters barely moved
Along the whispering sand -- till all the vast
Expanse of sea began to shake with heat,
And morning brought soft airs, by sailors loved.

And after? . . . Well . . .
The shop-bell clangs! Who comes?
Quinine -- I pour the little bitter grains
Out upon blue, glazed squares of paper. So.
And all the dusk I shall sit here alone,
With many powers in my hands -- ah, see
How the blurred labels run on the old jars!
***** -- and a cruel and sleepy scent,
The harsh taste of white poppies; India --
The writhing woods a-crawl with monstrous life,
Save where the deodars are set like spears,
And a calm pool is mirrored ebony;
***** -- brown and warm and slender-breasted
She rises, shaking off the cool black water,
And twisting up her hair, that ripples down,
A torrent of black water, to her feet;
How the drops sparkle in the moonlight! Once
I made a rhyme about it, singing softly:

Over Damascus every star
Keeps his unchanging course and cold,
The dark weighs like an iron bar,
The intense and pallid night is old,
Dim the moon's scimitar.

Still the lamps blaze within those halls,
Where poppies heap the marble vats
For girls to tread; the thick air palls;
And shadows hang like evil bats
About the scented walls.

The girls are many, and they sing;
Their white feet fall like flakes of snow,
Making a ceaseless murmuring --
Whispers of love, dead long ago,
And dear, forgotten Spring.

One alone sings not. Tiredly
She sees the white blooms crushed, and smells
The heavy scent. They chatter: "See!
White Zira thinks of nothing else
But the morn's jollity --

"Then Haroun takes her!" But she dreams,
Unhearing, of a certain field
Of poppies, cut by many streams,
Like lines across a round Turk shield,
Where now the hot sun gleams.

The field whereon they walked that day,
And splendor filled her body up,
And his; and then the trampled clay,
And slow smoke climbing the sky's cup
From where the village lay.

And after -- much ache of the wrists,
Where the cords irked her -- till she came,
The price of many amethysts,
Hither. And now the ultimate shame
Blew trumpet in the lists.

And so she trod the poppies there,
Remembering other poppies, too,
And did not seem to see or care.
Without, the first gray drops of dew
Sweetened the trembling air.

She trod the poppies. Hours passed
Until she slept at length -- and Time
Dragged his slow sickle. When at last
She woke, the moon shone, bright as rime,
And night's tide rolled on fast.

She moaned once, knowing everything;
Then, bitterer than death, she found
The soft handmaidens, in a ring,
Come to anoint her, all around,
That she might please the king.

***** -- and the odor dies away,
Leaving the air yet heavy -- cassia -- myrrh --
Bitter and splendid. See, the poisons come,
Trooping in squat green vials, blazoned red
With grinning skulls: strychnine, a pallid dust
Of tiny grains, like bones ground fine; and next
The muddy green of arsenic, all livid,
Likest the face of one long dead -- they creep
Along the dusty shelf like deadly beetles,
Whose fangs are carved with runnels, that the blood
May run down easily to the blind mouth
That snaps and gapes; and high above them there,
My master's pride, a cobwebbed, yellow ***
Of honey from Mount Hybla. Do the bees
Still moan among the low sweet purple clover,
Endlessly many? Still in deep-hushed woods,
When the incredible silver of the moon
Comes like a living wind through sleep-bowed branches,
Still steal dark shapes from the enchanted glens,
Which yet are purple with high dreams, and still
Fronting that quiet and eternal shield
Which is much more than Peace, does there still stand
One sharp black shadow -- and the short, smooth horns
Are clear against that disk?
O great Diana!
I, I have praised thee, yet I do not know
What moves my mind so strangely, save that once
I lay all night upon a thymy hill,
And watched the slow clouds pass like heaped-up foam
Across blue marble, till at last no speck
Blotted the clear expanse, and the full moon
Rose in much light, and all night long I saw
Her ordered progress, till, in midmost heaven,
There came a terrible silence, and the mice
Crept to their holes, the crickets did not chirp,
All the small night-sounds stopped -- and clear pure light
Rippled like silk over the universe,
Most cold and bleak; and yet my heart beat fast,
Waiting until the stillness broke. I know not
For what I waited -- something very great --
I dared not look up to the sky for fear
A brittle crackling should clash suddenly
Against the quiet, and a black line creep
Across the sky, and widen like a mouth,
Until the broken heavens streamed apart,
Like torn lost banners, and the immortal fires,
Roaring like lions, asked their meat from God.
I lay there, a black blot upon a shield
Of quivering, watery whiteness. The hush held
Until I staggered up and cried aloud,
And then it seemed that something far too great
For knowledge, and illimitable as God,
Rent th

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close *****-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimmed their clammy cell.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,---
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir, the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Press me into the mossed tree
flanked in auric diaspora
lifting billowing dress with one hand
pressing it with mine into the drape of fabric
framed by tree bark divets
breath incumbent
drifting in mellowed heaves
heavy against my frame
pulse cadence
requisite engorging
blood thinned
eyes dilated
spine *****
pinning me
expectancy
pelvic tilt
sacral arch
calf raking thigh
I climb you

rained heavy on the forlorn
white stone

April dusk had stood still
on deserted lane

iron gate to the lawn
showed mossed sleepy graves

tiptoed on the overgrown grass
for epitaph hard to read

Expect great things from God
opened eyes to more widely catch

Attempt great things for God
couldn't ruin it the ravage of years

outside tombstone waited a world
in the drizzle echoed the missionary's deathless sermon.

My eyes are not celestial suns of light
But pools reflecting woods mossed green and brown.
The common lip not coral like by sight
But pale as mine, and pink-soft as a gown.
If ******* be white, no woman’s wheat compares.
And women who place roses in fair cheeks
Win heavenly false prize of golden hairs.
My breath, like all who path to heaven seek,
Resembles no scent floral nor my sound
An avian tune rather my words be sweet.
‘Tis true my feet do grace the common ground
Though none I know descended to our heat.
    I think my beauty worthy yet and rare
    To covet not mock by poets unfair.

Since you called,
I've been writing,
here and there,
truthfully,
skinning the night,
searching for meat.

I've peeled back
the clouds: crimson,
the sky: split,
the stars: lit like the mossed edges of a scab,
the cosmos: a ****.

I'm getting weary,
all of this beneath me,
the earth becoming
a speck of dust:
absurd.

The kind of hurt you like to dole:
still there.

Can't I be an astronaut in peace?

Do you like the flattening of me,
into a pancake
like the night:
hammered and nailed
across the hemisphere?

I am the gravity-crushed,
the soul-sored, the black-hole ripped.

Opened and steaming,
I'm under the sky.

The emergency room of the brinking night drugs
and
a story of gleaming scars is my heart.

O, i wish i was a writer,
woven fine words and let all hell break loose.
Or a  sensuous dancer,
pranced on the rhythmic applause.
Definitely a great musician,
harped upon the melodies of life.
But am just a ****** peddler of thoughts,
in some old forgotten mossed lane,
beating the drums
& creating cacophony of my dreamy tales.

The house seemed to live on its own
In the silence of a monster waiting prey
Skin peeled off mossed abandoned
In a gloom quite untouched by the day!

It was the house standing last in the lane
Hidden in its dark ominous nook
Locked in closed door windowpane
Holding secret of a never opened book!

Not one sign of some life did it show
Bar a glassed shadow in the candlelight
Flickering for a while and then go
Like a passing phantom of the night!

Never go anywhere near that door
Cautioned us the elders in childhood
It was said weren’t seen anymore
Those ventured had disappeared for good!

We found in that lane a peaceful space
For a winter afternoon’s cricket match
Bowling and batting in low pace
When the ball was in air shouting catch!

It happened one day jumped the fence
A bounce took the ball past the wall
The children were worried and tense
Who would go to fetch it make a call!

None was ready to give the door a knock
Having heard about the house its weirdness
What would reveal once the **** was unlocked
Peeped from it the most macabre face!

They left as I stood there alone
With terror creeping to my core
When the wood creaked with a groan
Stood a woman on the opened door!

On her face shone a smile’s beaming star
As she held out the ball for my reach
While I wondered what made them call her
A ***** and child slaying witch!

Fat across three ribs of a bright green leaf,
A dewdrop rolled onto my tongue beneath,
Served cold and fresh direct from nature's dish,
Filtered through limestone and the gills of fish,

This immortal moisture once ran like oil,
Down an ancestors back doubled in toil,
Laden with memory mossed on their tomb,
It nourished their children warm in the womb,

Through fauna and flora time and again,
Their essence combined recycled as rain,
A powerful force that dribbles and slings,
Dictating life to perishable things,

With a solution of all it has known,
Returned to the sea through everyone's home.

january's the year
where mottled greyness
mingles in with a spitting torrent
of teawater
and shyly showing
slowing

a shadowed gold wisp
of cloudy hushedness
settles past broken branches
and scratched identity
mossed-over

past purple stones
upon the leaves of day
and afternoon's
gleaming water shimmer
though fathomed reaches falls
into icy teacup thoughts
through unswept orange light

in shortened shadows
down from a scudded moon
of frog dimples
and imperfect rays
as fire-cold steam
rises to a rapid slip-stream
and crish-crash clouds
hush and sigh:
diminished lightening shock

coagulate my soul
oh wind,
flush my brute
me-ness
out of this landscape
and instill
clarified serenity.

send my gentle salute
to the soft fauna,
the slippery ones
who divulged their grace
to my philistine vision

divorce every
Peopled Preference
(moneyednewroadstrafficreports)
and Terminate the scent
of those who wrench
the sweet tang of Spring
from this downy mossed asylum

(and plas-stick it into
fraudulent bottles
for decrepit wrinkled
“Lacquer Rouge” lips
to desecrate)


ferment the scape
forever into my
Fickle Recollection
so that
as I regress
to my most sickly
human configuration
I may still be

part Sky,
part Dust.

The water chuckles and frolics
Finding its way over the rocks
It gurgles around boulders
And swirls and tumbles and drops.

The banks of the streams are strewn
With flower petals, pink and rosy
They settle gently on fern fronds
Looking peaceful, comfy and cozy.

The steep sides of the gully are shale
And water seeps out in places
It finds its way into pools
Where the minnows are having races.

I know about oceans and lakes and rivers
About power dams and high waterfalls
I appreciate the importance of water
I love it from wherever it calls.

But my private stream in this gulley
Teeming, insected', berried and mossed
Seems akin to a forest primeval
Where the Hand of the Goddess just passed.

(t'is the spine, from which we need speak)


this then the secret you knew
but could not speak,
for you did not
know it
in the way
knowing was needed...

what do we owe each other,
when first we speak,
of that risk greatest ever taken,
cross the line
from maybe to amour?

exciting times,
heartbeat and pulse,
performing an un~orchestrated
syncopated rhythm,
your mind 's eye,
never more focused, observant,
never more judgement~poor,
for distortion of love heat
have affected your flying instruments...

this then I will answer,
for though memories are mossed,
certain things are burnished
and I remember my first loves
and I remember my first crushings,
as if they were yet to happen...

so when to the negotiating table come,
outstretched, your hands,
pleading your case,
you owe her this:

from the spine speak,

ignore the eyes and heated heart
signal distortions,
if you wish to tell her
how you have come to feel~believe,
tell her from the spine...

for if in agreement,
you will never stand taller

if on two different steps you stair,
if lucky, time may cure you
of your hunchback crooked ****,
for the crook will have stolen your straight,
which is why they call him and
now, you too, sadly,
crooked...

character is your best selling point,
*so, from the spine speak

So November's Come,
Hazy leaves deck the trees;
Rotten ****** wrecked the sprecht,
gotta please, gotta tease.
Cotton crusted smile
took the style while spine dumb;
Freeze as whacks churn
spurned, danced to the crime hum.
Early squeeze amidst blitzed spritz, dark romancing,
prancing picket line fum-
bled; Ambled twixt crowds antsing.
Glazed, took prior avenue
espoused culture tazed/
Fazed, ascends erased hub,
Dire mazed/Liar snubbed;
Nah crowd sourced: after-shock stancing/
Corp core flexed waves/paves vexed glancing,
Dropped four, floor to score, music cull en(c)hancing.
Enchantingly out of touch; Butchered lemming dancing.

Rupturous rapturing gospel takes all:
Sports neck line with wreck wine drenched via stall,
Appalling, talling tower looms abroad
Broad took shin dig as grin, fling; swig accord.
Objectified Subject, with verb kept in tow
flits through the fine lines, and cracks in the snow.

Noticed grave shadows, slow; ravens attest
a'Gig'a'Sibling invested in scoping, and chest;
Blooming bioluminescence scatters down/
Frothy broth fairly broiled. Scorn fawning Noun/
Habit forming, tarnished, ab(d)jectified malt-core
Verby? Nun-thank-you-muchly, Mary Mag-dolla store.

.... So November's Come,
Clubbed, stepped and altared.
Brushed away the dark hype
crowd mic check faltered.
Dastardly respite. Psyche.
Planted positively preened
nature:societal fiend
crept crudely, rudely James Deaned.
Pants 'cocked, stewed, steamed',
Megalithic mount gleaned
as posture postulates
cost you fate, spate-spoke-stake, ****-rate
vibrate denatured, protein plucked feud
fueled larger sense of afterlife tense imbued.
Spotted shortly crossèd portly,
tautly tossed courtly cost,
'nawt'ly flossed' possed thoughtly;
Sportly Mossed Kate washed
scene brimmed/beamed/loved
'Leaned' fussed. Trussed team musk/
Stock puppet power-aid, raid's pretty husk.
****** sidekicks show side slicks, stuck chiming bitty.
Flickering afterdark lark glistens, gritty-city-fitty.
Bought distorted Faster Mark, Narc acrossed shark,
passed past the Rasta Park, embarked'n'stashed arc.

Dark the dreams that crept to the fallen gate/
dazzled gems and hellish rhinestones irk fate.
Grated joy, plated coyly, then doff broke;      
spoke symphony of fattened tire/wire frame joke;
Took twisted lyre, choir, to tame my europa,
maybz next time a better luck'n'fly my eloper,
clucky chickens plucked/fussed/cussed, a fitting trend,
Spare parts missing neural heart; a plasticated end.

Friends, family and strangers of the past,
Those who exist no more
Lie, decaying and crumbling beneath the grass.
Those who walked upon this floor,
Those who felt well,
Those who were afraid
Prance and dance around the great bell,
Replaying the ringing heard through the decades.

The snow falls, glittering white on mossed stone.
The sun shines, rays upon the engravings.
The leaves fall, they roam and then are gone,
They lay next to those that wanted saving.

To see myself as I am now,
And to see myself in a hundred years from now,
It saddens me, it scares me
That I’ll just be another memory,
Then faded and forgotten.

Backed by a belief that  butchery
is part of a survival strategy to cling
to the edifices of power blackened by the bomb
and bunker smoke of fighting in the trenches of hate

Hidden in hell holes beneath the barren  browning landscape
scattered across the fragile face of the desert
soldier rats rush into pock-marked craters
as the planes overhead search them out with infrared
points to demolish and bury them
in the graves the enemy nation
carved for cemeteries
unmarked
in the battlefields of bourgeoisie.

War brings  the drones of mercy
raining  from the skies of hate
piercing through the armament of commands
from Generals decorated in medals of honour
from the Boys Club and  green mossed jackets.
Sit, daddy,  in rifle ready barricades
awaiting the crackle  command
from higher up the food chain.

Those who make those decisions are unaware
a child sits at home playing with a little toy soldier
"Made in China" from printed plastic moulds
of mass production and extermination.

"Daddy is my hero.
He will come home for Christmas."

He wont. This time round, son.

Author Notes
The Toy soldier.
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved.

Get out or peel
Cause the sunken place is real
Even at a family meal
My passion for isolation
Isn’t wrong
try being Bambi
And the gun
Then tell your son
Why you always run
But let me rewind
Cause Nas needs a retake
My passion for isolation
Needs a dissertation
So you can get my full explanation
Simply put
my deer and I
Going to put you snakes in a ninja
Now ****** hit the blender
And tell that ginger with the shakes
That your cyclops can die
like a great scott
But back to the plot
The blood in my veins
Is full of spaghetti lanes
Cause at every junction
Is my destruction
My last name is stained
So I will break the glass
Then piece it back
With a x cause my family tree
Needs a axe cause
They act but only on a razzie level
So lets give the gremlins revel
Cause I know the devil
Fires and brimstone at home
Y’all see why I rather be alone?

I didn’t have fans like fran
Or friends like Ross
So why do I feel lost
Since in friendship I always get
Mossed
They have a Patton on my name
So they **** at it to drain
My money always generous with bands
They bless hands
but y’all don’t stand
Like your a Kaepernick man
Cause y’all see me as Stan
So let me help you understand
Dear my friends that always had my back
I hope you eat this kinda like snack
Cause once you see this you might here
A smack
Let’s hop in you hoopty dare or die?
I was being weird but so what
I’m careless guy
So let’s drive to train track park
Then see my reply
Cause I wouldn’t even had killed them
That’s for it Hennessy to decide

Last is Venus which ruled my penius
But ruined my genius
I had life by the throat
but its me too now
So I have to listen to her and not poke
Curves are fun and breast are too
But what happens when they crash into you
Not a Emmy more a semi
Cause I wrote the screenplay
that got you remi
That got you furs coats and houseboats
But you keep taking tokes
Welp I hope you choke
I take 4 branches from my tree
Then add 12 fallen leaves let’s see
That’s 16 but I need 2 nuts to roast
That’s 18 then add 2 more let’s toast
That’s 20 or lions a dream
Then burn it down cause
I had to Barry them to save my team
So my conviction
is pick up your eviction
I’m already past it like Drake after Quentin

Curled up
in a corner

staring at the mossed walls
amidst the light that devours fireflies

the petrichor is now stronger
than all the ales I had

this reverie
the imagery shows no sign of ceasing

and with everything coming back to me
I am ready to stumble again

and fall every step
to write and rewrite

the joy is somewhat incessant
like it always has been.

Blood trails on the mossed Greek cheeks
The Memories' eternal catch but a wink in the cemeteries
My hands are made of spider webs,
Mine own heart, of shards
Fly, away they fly blue and white butterflies

A wine glass rolls in my hand, in my red lips.
Here stands Mona Lisa in my ethel funeral,
My abode so criminal: black leaves,
wrinkled lake, and dusted music box

A haunted castle in my spectral soul has
A marble floor extending its arms
To the mosaic of stained glass made
Of old apparitions

I, hopelessly romantic
Under the arch of an inscrutable moon gate
My clandestine tears on love letters
Stained with times and cherry wine

My rose is my wand so shy
Spellbound together like a parchment of decree
To the concaving world for a long farewell
Anonymous me! A man without pedigree

By the ruins of far nymphaeum, where
A garden of sculptures echoes underwater,
Where lost dwellers sleep of inarticulate tears,
I submerge like a goddess who lost her firstborn

On the cliffside where lobelia blooms
Wait I motionlessly amid the gyre of speeding seasons  
Hidden like burnt legends of gods
Like a page in the Library of Divine

"Stay broken
There's a reason things are unwanted"

The stoked charcoal turns into smoke just to evaporate like a ghost
I'm just a phantom of your rusted conscience
Any more thought and you'd break
We'd be together, but it doesn't matter
Your master is no longer on the ladder
You detached his tattered hands
For him to fall to mossed-over spikes to lie and die
Alone

You broke me
I'll follow your last request
I'll make sure to stay shattered
I have always followed my mind
So why betray you now, master

her eyes shine so blue
sometimes I get lost
I truly knew not what to do

T’was our love that blossomed and grew
With no fear for the coming frost
Her eyes shine so blue

My heart was for her through and through
I had to keep her at any cost
I truly knew not what to do

The rain it fell and the wind it blew
Trees fell and lines were crossed
Her eyes shine so blue

I fell to my knees, scuffed up my shoe
Looked to the sky with eyes glossed
I truly knew not what to do

I held tight to the thing I knew was true
And released anything mossed
Her eyes shine so blue
I truly knew not what to do

nearing time

a ring of stars told me the future is
the sea that you try to grasp with
your broken hands and the past will
not be changed it is stained with rust
and flotsam as your inside ebbs like
the mossed ruin in the dunes as salted
grass fails to grow as the wind shakes
the waves you are alone and alone

She was a Messiah, with boys bowed at her knees.
But when their mouths a-gaped, she'd close them quickly, begging them not to speak.
She'd keep them close to fill a void. But no matter how many, it could never be solved.
So she took, and she took, never letting them touch.
Until now,
Where we have nothing.

And now I am no Messiah, more like the off grid Wise-Women.
Hidden within the thickets, on the edge of the forest.
Some still travel, and they do find me. But it's not the same as before.
They come to me for ailments of the mind and heart.
To listen to their woes of a past they can't leave behind.
When I out-stretch caring arms, they take a step back. Begging me not to come closer.

They take and they take, never letting me touch.
Because inside, they have nothing.

What a cruel turn of fate for the girl who fought her way through years of the past to be in the present once again.
Some may call it karma for my younger self's mistakes.
Now destined to starve the heart that was once filled till day-break.
So I sit awake at night full of other's worries in my mind.
Because if I cannot be desired, at least I can be useful.

I guess the young girl never learned how to simply exist.
Without the presence of transactional love, she may as well be extinct.
This is no way to live.
You will never feel whole if there is still a quiet, constant longing to fix or be fixed by someone else's soul.

So I sit in the stillness of my isolated garden.
With nothing more than the damp, mossed floor and early dawn chorus.
I may be on my own, but I am never lonely.
I am one with the world around me.
I am the Wise-Women.

the page remains unturned
tho the bottom corner
has been worried into a soft dog ear

it is not that the words are boring
the plot mundane, or the prose stilted
it is I who cannot read the black ink
the same words repeating in my mind

as i stare out into the garden
my ability to read is well below par
as i day dream the hours away

content to be a  warm, squishy cushion
to the tuxedo rex cat,
as he dreams panther dreams
and purrs like a Massey Ferguson

outside the window, in the hazy warmth
a dragonfly darts about the garden,
before settling with dainty precision
upon the craggy green mossed rock
at the pond's edge, a pause, a blink,
then the insect alights again

i too should be up and about....
but i am anchored by lassitude
and  three and a half kilos
of contented cat....
whose daydreams  are not
to be disturbed....

.
The wind carries its soft dirge
Out to sea, across a lamented
Land of bones and vail memory,
Sea birds sail in solitary griefs—
Above the loam that light darkens
As each soot year is lowly churned.

And the slate stones are mossed,
Like trees that no one is hearing,
In forests bereft, unto the shawls
Of ferns as they bleed in the dank
Undergrowths of sorrels and ****
Curling in trite, pale green contritions.

In cemetery lots, the dead are ******,
Intoxicated on their lost beds of lime,
Where trees surround in wrangled keeps
And bare feet's are buried by the spades,
With the untrod grasses, trimmed like nails
And the daisies that rain from the ground.
.

Adventurer, my adventurling,
Wandering the wild woods of newness,
Fern fresh. Smells unknown
To a nose
That knows nothing of wet leaves
And undergrowth,
Mulch that dampens in the rain,
Mossed rock soppy and soaked
With age.
Novice to the backpack, outback,
Untracked tracks on unspoiled paths.
****** to the bluest eyes
Cut softly, gently, waterly
By lakes of mountains,
Lakes of skies.
Mirror to the heavens
The untrodden, barren, open wasteland full of light.
Touch toes to ancient rocks,
Reach hands to ancient stars
And know, that as old and wandered
As you are,
They will always be new.

1
Open well
Rounded
Stones
Water-worn
And mossed-

Light lichen
Grazing
Top touch
Stone-

Stone
And water
And air

Open like
Spinal
Column

Ganglion
Connection

Through which
Pass all
Sensations

Necessities of
Air
Water
Growth
And stone-

2
Well and
Open to
All
Sensation

And necessary
Breath
Of life

Through
Bodies rigid
With fear
With joy
Withal
Emotion
Travail

Travelling
Through ether
Escape
The mortal

Soul

Livid
Live

Breathing
Stone
Air-moss-lichen
Water

­Well alive