May be I’ll start writing, today.  
The story of Zen Zero.

I realized that all good things come to an end.  The tears, the affairs, and even the faintest revelation about my relationship to the Emperor of Japan.  I’ll need help and... well, the truth can be tolled.  It can be that the faintest belief, that we as free people are subject to the king, our God.
A king stands in truth as our kin.  The love that has existed for a thousand years, about justice, permanence, and legend are here.
It all started 7 years ago.  According to the book of John, the 3rd book.  The face of his majesty does have an Imperial Guardian.  In any colour, red, black, blue, white, and even green.  Each color resembles the color of trust.  
I started training in the Emperor's garden at the age of negative 6.  Before my mother can conceive her unborn child in a marriage.  Like the burning of Shin Cho' Palace.  
"Oh, how they forget so quickly, the truth?" says my mother.
They forget so quickly the majesty and power of the Emperor's memory of Mother Japan.  In his Majesty's eyes, how many lovers stir the colors of benevolence.  Where and when does it exist and stop for us as an American patriot sold to slavery for spy’s.  All of his subjects do will and listen to the cry of patience in his family’s quarters.  
My father at the time of his marriage did not know the Emperor's name, I had asked my mother in her heart if she knew the king.  They are no longer married.  They had tried to burn down the Emperor's Palace with a marriage.  But I had already existed, in the love of my family at a wedding joining men and women.  I remember some singing, all though in my mother’s ears, really bad singing. In her head or mine at the wedding, whichever is greater.  Maybe the song was worthless or was the singer already lifting her fingers to strike matches on the bamboo fortress of the young emperor.  
They have had many statesmen destroy the dream that Japan has.  Through lies, corruption, and *******.  Each of the last three I had to conquer to be his Majesty's Justice.  I did not earn the right to judge any such subject or people, it was given freely at that time to children.  I had learned to love the Emperor, even in my own desire to please him and her.  
The lies were towering revelations about the coming of man in God's kingdom, and how the will of imperial veils never existed for the properties of mankind.  The corruption was the setting of dowers or dowries for the subject of lost families, in the forbearance of lucher escaped only by the luck of liars.  And then the dreams of revelry, owned by the ungodly and chaste men of the burning palace, whether sediscious, or whether the fables absolving time in the palace to a judgment had already met the Emperor.  
All of the priests (pre-ests) had to pray; for the remaining time of eternity, for the true judgment of his Majesty's subjects. It was to be taken from the subject of srys to the Emperor's Knight.  
To many were lost in the munitions of war.  Laws that govern and sanction truths were not available to those of absolute corruption.  Stalwarts, stonewallers, and stoners were becoming of the anti-gentry.  The laws were never to be discouraged by zeal, or by trial.  The laws had to represent the ability of love to change time even if the object of factions destroyed the old way.  They had taken the truth to prepare Neoteny for where the first Imperial Guard had placed his head.  The first Imperial Guard, that I became before birth had taken his own head with a weapon made by treason.  
My mother’s dress was made out of spider silk.  A giant spider played Chinese checkers with the Imperial Guard for my head also.  Never the less, the palace, this time was not burned.  The dress was made out of falling stars and spiders silk.  She had found the Emperor's tailor and traded my soul for the wedding.  The pictures that were retrieved from the wedding of my mother and father have ruminated in antiquity since the time until by birth my life.  The seers and srys wanted my head to take up the Emperor's chalice.  His cup, filled with my blood, Simian blood.  
I did not want to go through with it, birth and death before becoming subject to royalty.  Seeing the world before consummation, as I had was never thought of, it was seen as impossible unless by treason we had chided a woman of royalty.  
I have seen the last major asteroid go through our galaxy before it had ever had been a present particle of mutiny.   It proved to the child (myself) in gestation, between man woman at the wedding that time will pass just as quickly before my mind’s eye as it had at the day of Pentecost.   More than 500 billon people were to be saved by God rather than by a humble dismantling of a defense lawyer.
I had seen how flowers are made by tiny Zen Zero bumble bees going to and leaving from daisies and roses, and orchids.  How each seed takes roots and as do the munitions for treason and tears; how each man whom chooses to change their name because of treason begins to understand change when his wife chooses his name.  (The reference is to Zero attacks, suicide attacks.)  How the time and life and essence of life begins in literacy as a language of love.  Every old man on earth can help me write the scripts, but can the country of old men help me change the prophet?
As long as there is war in the palace there will be treason?
The spirit of the samurai was trying the youth in the palace.  From the first born male to the last lady in quixic geisha.  All uniques were to be placed before the Lord for appointment.  Any dreams of or visions of truth were a breach of solemnity lost by the virginity of the family.  The parents of each state were subjects to the Emperor's people, and to the chosen for freedom and slavery.  How many shining knights were to remain in the Emperor's house?  The uniqueness was subject only to the reason of the generation of the age.  Not many of my men had anything left after the life of the quill or pen of the Knight Meteyi had begun to take its place with the heads of loyalists.  His sword remains in the hand of the Majesty of Japan.  No knowledge, no lore, no president, no kin, or liars can stop his reign.  As if the last days of our youth were spent dismantling the bombs we had made during the last few battles over crude extravagance.  Oil, crops, metals, space, as space became a way to admire men in statehood was the example of treason to the following.  Democrats and Republicans began to try as is a trail of laws to and from changes for the people without a loyal subject to observe in service to a Nation.  Freed men became a bureau of Federally Bureaucratic Investigative subjections.  Whether the phone would sense its use and had no service.  Men tried by srys had needed no way to communicate, they were objects, objections, and objective to democracies.  Any and all of the western knowledge of good or evil was not earned in monasteries, it was as it were seen in-between a marriage of a man and a woman and the consummation of the first born to be the king in his own mind. Centrally, intelligence and agency became a lost paradox.  The palace could be burned through neoteny, the truly lost man or woman had to be part of the worm.  The earthworm had to dig up the lost and the prophet from its own humanly death.  

Chapter 2
The dress as simple as it was, was taken off and laid in a box for saving.  It was to travel through time in the Emperor's Palace to serve has a mold, a pattern for quilting lovers of the family tree through the history of love.  After the child was conceived in love, the dress is worn and then placed back into the box for time travel. From a generation of mothers to another generation of lovers. No man was to wear the dress as an idea, thought or wisdom.  The reproach, the dress, and the marriage is virtue encoded into a structure of life   The wisest man let the Emperor dream life into the belly of prophets through the dress.  The smartest scientist understood the impeccable reason of lust and gave all to his bride for the grave that the earthworm had trusted.  The publican had the dress made as a dowry to the tribe of Roman man.  And the Emperor breathed life into the woman with a few breaths at the wedding.  The subjects, the publicans had tried the Emperor for their bride, by making the flowers lean toward their lovers.  They had tried to tell the knight of the Emperor's Palace that the sun had also retired due to mutiny in the ranks and castes of statesmen.  The son will bend light into the palace of wisdom, and the subjects do grieve the stories from prophets.  
At exactly 10:03 central eastern standard time, the states men forgave themselves of suicide and left to burn the palace.  
Each dressed as royalists.  The burning of Chinju Palace is the last thing I remember before giving up to the sound of a 3 or 4 year old woman singing.  The next thing I remember is being dropped on the floor in the delivery room to a rattle and brattle of childish whims.  Like, the sound of laughter, but only as a fury of deceit, the singer was hurt when I had asked her to join the wedding ceremony.  She excused herself of the ceremony as was or were not subjects to the birth of the kings men in harmony.  

She tried, and wanted to steal the dress.  

Chapter 3
There was mostly nothing in the womb. Except Dogma.  My father, as dogma.  He would whisper to her in bed and they would giggle about never understanding anything ever again.  I excepted NAME for my name.  They didn’t know if a boy or a girl were to be born.  I could know the difference at the time of their conversation.  I then realized that the 3 years prior to conception were perfect.  And I, the Emperor's Knight, was tolled.  Tolled the way bells sound and the way people love to hear the news.  The way light has no existence in the womb, I was tolled the way Sandalphon treaded upon the tribe of Israel.  
Lying was not invented yet, well,... while in the womb, but I had heard some whispers in the darkness.  The camera couldn't fit in, I called and tolled the camera from the womb, in between to friends.  I called the camera, Dragon.  The dragon is the trust moving in-between true and time.  The Dragon, Meteyi had told me that we were going to write everything.  From the believe that martial arts were stronger than prayer, and to the reason that it was not true.  Factually, there was nothing but prayer and no martial artist had a sword bigger than the lie of the Emperor's dragon.  The dragon said, to my father,..."The world is to die for, and not enough."  The dragon also said to my mother,..."The purpose is in your belly as a rainbow in disgust."  He, the dragon almost couldn’t believe that I had mentioned to hymn that there was no way out of this without a dream so relax and let me fit in.  The doctor had to have heard of the loyalist dream of a birth right.  Basically, I didn’t want him to slap me for the first breath.  I hurt bad, like out of a sarcastic Scotlandish parody.  Many, many, many, men quit trying to go through the sry after that.  My mother creeped up to me after my kin had asked the doctor to pick me up off of the floor.  She smiled and handed the birth certificate to the nurse and read my social security number to my father on the phone, he was on duty at the Air Force Base.  My ears were still clogged with seminal fluid, but I could feel her dream a name into my soul.  She can know the Emperor's knight.  After a few moments, my cry as chide by the Emperor, into being a whisper of life.  From that moment on in my life, I could not cry ever, as a child cries.  Otherwise I could be a whisper.

Chapter 4
Every chance at change that had gotten to us was used by running from the dragon.  He liked Batman and hated Robin but new to fathers, knew that hatred kept something’s safe from the palace. The palace could never get filled by whispers.  The whispers only object to democracy and help the camera.  The daguerreotype was possibly the only thing that couldn’t lie.  It was considered lye to gossip worshipers.  Gossip may have started the war on bugs.  Like bugs in ceaseless noise are prayer or whispers, like gossip.  When bugs stop whispering, some seemingly are bad with superstition and others are horrible with bugs.  
The next few years, were also perfect.  I had no idea who else, I could be.  Absolutely perfect, the Emperor subjected us to love.  I could **** all day, eat as much as I wanted and was warned when they thought, like a whisper.  When it was time to eat, when it was time to bath and when it was time to be quiet and sleep were similar to whispers.  Diapers were not invented yet, I had to invent them.  My mother used to get sick from the pain of laundry and sleeping with me.  When the diapers were *****, she wash them and place them back on my ****.  Like a good, palace guardian, I used them up.  The new diapers had an air of mutiny to them, the disposable ones.  We never kept trash in the house.  The signs that we have had a king for dinner were never to be seen, but everyone had the right to change pants.  
Many of the ideas in life shared before birth were not existent after birth.  It was not until my family had meet the Emperor that... we needed to love God by learning to pray.  

Chapter 5
When we met the Emperor, it was easy to say that no whispers were used.  Other things were.  A memory, not a book was here.  There was no time, the palace he made for me was from God and a lot of people wanted in.  The Royal subject was the Emperor's first knight, my father's.  I had to memorize time, which in turn was not mine.  The actual Emperor thought, that I, am a poet of sorts.  We spelled the word memory in the sky together without words, whispers, or gossip.  The next few years were spent dyeing as tap or a drill bit would being to make a hole for fastening life to the surface of my families.  Called a tap and die, the whole of life must be treaded through time without a spry attempt to vacancy.  After the Emperor, my mother and father did not know that meeting the pope was bad.   The Emperor is good.  

Chapter 6
Mainly my ability to learn, had started to fail.  There was not need to have ability.  But walking was hard.  When I stood, I was pushed through, walking.  Like a battle of balance and superstition.  Crawling had no sense, being picked up made things silly.  When wanting to be here, and not knowing how to get there through crawling, here I was a a chubby fat knight.  Father used lemons on my taste buds and cracked when he knew not how I loved them.  He had to make work to pay bills and I learned that without a whisper.  So we would sh

THE MEETING

Alone one night neath lantern light, I trudged a weary mile.
Forlorn, I went with shoulders bent (the storms around me howled)
until I met a Silhouette behind a sultry smile –
She gazed with eyes that mesmerize (Her body caped and cowled)
and stayed my way with question fey, ‘Why don’t you while awhile?’

Though timorous (with slow address and gestures pantomimed)
Her voice was gracing echoes chasing waves in evening’s tide.
The churchyard groaned, an ***** moaned, the bells of midnight chimed
while wanton winds awoke and dinned, and mistrals multiplied.
The Persian moon, like stray balloon, arose and blithely climbed.

The Silhouette (a pale brunette) arched eyebrows meant to please,
and down the lanes, on windowpanes, the shadows danced and sighed.
A meadowlark within the dark, somewhere behind the breeze,
ennobled Her with wisps of myrrh while deigning to confide
to nightingales veiled whispered tales of human vanities.

She doffed her cloak before She spoke with sighs of sorrow sung
(like mandolins, as night begins, when mourning day’s demise)
and spun Her tale of grim travail and tears She'd shed when young.
As jagged volts of thunderbolts lit up the dismal skies,
a velvet fog embraced a bog in coils of curling tongues.

Through summer vales and winter gales Her secret thoughts were voiced.
Midst storms so cruel (neath lightning’s jewel that glistered on the ridge)
She reminisced, She touched... we kissed... Her lips were wet and moist...
A lighthouse dimmed, while moonbeams skimmed across a distant bridge
to avenues where residues of shallow shades rejoiced.

                        HER TRAGIC TALE

“Midst sweet perfume of youthful bloom, the lonely spirit braves
and often cries and sometimes dies in quest of her amour.”

While starry-eyed, a ship I spied, a’ sail upon the waves –
the galleon docked, the gannets flocked, the Captain swept ashore
where, debonair with gypsy flair, he led his salty knaves.

In passing by, he caught my eye - I tried to hide a blush,
but ambiance of innocence left fervour’s flames revealed.
His gaze (defined by eyes that shined) beheld my cheek a’ flush.
I bowed my head while caution fled, I felt my fate was sealed
- a bird in spring with fledgling wing - he’d snared a  falling thrush.

He said ‘Hello’ - I answered ‘No’ and yet before he’d gone
said I, ‘I’ll wait at Heaven’s Gate not far beyond the Pale’.
At dusk he came neath moon aflame, and left before the dawn
just humming tunes between the dunes that lined the sandy trail
beside a pond where morning yawned, where swam an ebon swan.

We met again, and once again, and once again, again
entangled in a love called sin, in whirls of make-believe.
While in my arms, with voice that charms, said he ‘I must explain -
the tide awaits in distant straits and I must take my leave’.
Then tempests stormed as passions swarmed through ardor’s hurricane.

‘Forsake your home and we may roam’ he smiled as if to tease
and still naive, said I ‘I’ll leave, in silver buckled shoes’.
He took the helm in search of realms, and quickly quit the quays -
with tearful eyes, I bade goodbyes to fare-thee-well adieus
and sailed above a wave of love across the seven seas.

We swept one morn around Cape Thorne while bound for Bullion Bay.
With naught to reck, I strolled on deck, a baby at my breast,
while flurries blew and seagulls flew within the ocean’s spray.
Our ship soon moored, we went ashore and off to Fortune’s Quest -
with gold doubloons which shone like moons, he gambled through the day.

‘The deuce is wild’ he thinly smiled; another card was drawn -
he’d staked and raised with eyes half glazed, was dealt a dismal three.
With betting tight throughout the night, the final ace long gone,
meant all was lost, at what a cost; alas, the prize was me.
To my dismay he slunk away and left me doomed at dawn.

A buccaneer with ring in ear sneered ‘now, my dear, you’re mine’.
He held my wrists to thwart my fists and then... my honor stained.
On sullied swash, the sky awash with bitter tears of brine,
I broke his clutch with nothing much of me that still remained:
a residue when he was through, left clinging to a vine.

In morning dew, the good folk knew, and spurned me in my plight.
The preacher man pronounced a ban and wouldn’t condescend,
ignored my pleas on bended knees and prayers by candlelight.
While cast aside, my baby died... my world was at an end.
Until this day, I’ve made my way beneath the shades of night.


                        AT HEAVEN’S GATES

To set Her free from destiny was far from my design,
but, though unplanned, I touched Her hand to give Her peace of mind.
She told me then, and then again, that providence Divine
had cast a curse, and even worse: despised by all mankind,
She walked alone, unseen, unknown, Her soul incarnadine.

To break this spell of living hell, of loneliness enshrined,
and end Her days within the haze, a sole redeeming deed
would give reprieve and maybe leave our destinies entwined -
Her final quest be put to rest if only I agreed,
but no surcease nor perfect peace nor hope if I declined.

The shadows, shawled in silence, crawled, the night Her fate was sealed
as vespers tolled across the wold beneath the muted fog.
The heavens cracked and sorrow slacked as chimes of children pealed
while in the hills (where midnight chills) there wailed a daemon dog -
with no delay I lead the way, the path to Potter’s Field.

Her weathered face was lined with Grace, Her eyes shone emerald green.
With me as guide She stepped inside to grieve and mourn Her loss,
and thereupon, though pale and wan, the night took on a sheen.
With weary eyes as Her disguise, She placed a wooden cross
upon a mound (unhallowed ground) and whispered ‘Sibylline...’.

A falling star flared in the far and burst, a bolide flame -
beneath the light, the Final Rite no longer hid undone.
And kneeling there in silent prayer, we seemed to share the shame
but could atone if left alone, forevermore as one.
Before we both could breathe an oath, I asked Her once Her name.

Through lips, pale red, She simply said ‘Some called me Abigail’,
and neath a birch where white doves perch, I took Her for my bride,
beheld Her smile a little while, but all to no avail...
Her cloak and cape, and shrivelled shape lie empty at my side...
for now She waits at Heaven’s Gates, not far beyond the Pale.

i have a right to speak ALOUD
ALLOWED to give my two CENTS
SENSE of freedom in opinions TOLD
TOLLED by thoughts that i dispense

i have a right to let them KNOW
NO others have walked my COURSE
COARSE visions from my own EYE
I write in blood from the source

I look up from my book
to find beams of warm sunlight
touching my face,
the chugging of the train
accompanied by its whistling,
become my aural companions
for the journey,
as I look at scenes that
unfold before my eyes :
I pass by hawkers
trying to sell their wares,
their calls mingled with
joyous voices,
of children
excited about their
first train journey,
of families
on their way,
perhaps, to attend a wedding,
or to celebrate the birth
of a much awaited child.

I see :
village belles toiling away
on fields;
shabby looking buildings
speaking of years of neglect;
temples ringing with the sounds of
bhajans being sung with religious fervour,
bells being tolled, pleading
the gods to look down
from their divine abodes;
roadside stalls filling the air
with aromas of food,
promising hearty meals.

They are all ephemeral sights, and yet,
they have become a part of me -
the smells, the sights -
they shall bring back memories
that will become my companions
in solitude.

Vespertine, fatal dream
Mistress conjuring shapes of night
Seventeen little fiends
Elegy for a demon’s plight


Alone in my study, sitting
before a roaring fire
Visions so ******
they churn desire

With the dead of night
summoning hellish zest
They come to incinerate
my corrosive flesh

The hymns of *St. Lazarus beckon solace
from the cathedral outside
But I linger here in the bowels,
where my ancestral sins reside

Animistic stares gazing through
these dead-soul dreams
Where another horror story is not
always what it seems

Portraits of deceased queens
looked down at me with blackened eyes
Layers of muffled screams
festered while judging my vacant lies

Years before, my grandmother watched
over me as a boy in his bed;
Endless, ambiguous rhymes of prayer
are what she often said.

She promised to ban the spirits
that steadily linger
But dark twisting hands
outreached and took her

The monsters and invisible abominations
have always been here
Following my whereabouts,
watching me year after year

Subtle ghosts keeping my heart
and house cold
I sat and waited for what my
icy breath foretold

The dreams, the demons, the ghosts
all that severed me
From experiencing the love of flesh
I so forever longed to see


Came the hour the church bells rang and tolled


The dread of things to come
The moans and cries had begun

From lissome shadows and corridors
Like Charon beating souls with oars


Creeping evil fled
to the refuge of my home
To reap the sins
that my family had sewn

The rippling, screeching strings
of a malevolent orchestra
Scored and produced themes
worthy of infernal Sumatra

The flames in the fireplace
surged a green incendiary wall
From the hell mouth jaw emerged
a dark figure I saw.

Mother Mephistopheles,
            clad in silvery pieces with a pale face
            Manifesting atrocities, her emerald eyes
            welcoming our embrace

I backed away from the sights in,
my trance lost in her glimmer
But the noises and choir peaked
in a swarming fit for a sinner

In a gush of surrounding ash, Father Selaphiel materialized
The otherworld lovers reunited,
their bond revitalized.

“We come unto thee, Son of Faust, heir to Blake.”
They said in unison like a choral demon snake

“Create a fleshling worthy of a child, of many in one
So the deeds of your family’s sins can be undone.”

I stared at the figures with execrable bewilderment
Fearing my sanity had seeped through my temperament

They threaten my eternal existence with continued torment
A living anguish that would solidify my hell-bound descent

“What must be done?” I asked these surrogate advisers

And they instructed
A body made from flesh and metal
Of dead and living components
Blessed and cursed
From God and Satan
Men and creature
Using their collected powers
to merge with the night
I swept across the villages
and cities to obtain the materials
Now all these years, I’ve wondered
Why my medical expertise had been put to waste
“Did the demons prevent me?” I pondered
“Or did they aid me?” I concluded in my haste

Innocent or not, I claimed what I needed
To rid myself of the terrors deep-seated.

A steel-woven chest piece
and half-incinerated cadaver
Twenty feet of large intestines;
boys, girls didn’t matter

Shelled-out cranial cavity
with cerebral cortex to match
Mixing bladders and gallbladders
worth its catch

Punctured spleens and insolent creams
Circulatory, digestive, endocrine,

Iron bones, infused tendons mount
Smells and rancid odors spilling out

Guts, pus, worms and maggoty brains
Boiling in holy water with dried remains

Sacks of chain mail and velveteen potions
Seething concoctions conflate emotions

Patches of caustic skin made like adamant leather
Bolted with steel fingered brutally severed

Into gauntlet armor, this mechanized abomination
Personifying my sickened, wailing degradation

I showed Father and Mother my life’s work and creation
A flesh-iron shell waiting, they stood with appreciation

“Vespertine…” they called to the collage of my work
They petted its face while the shadows continued to lurk

Seventeen little fiends and creatures
appeared and surround
The moon shined through the glass
and the room around

The Seventeen shadow children became smoke and entered the monster
Now a being both ethereal and corporeal

My sins and demons locked in my own creation
Mother Mephistopheles and Father Selaphiel
Left Vespertine in my care

All that plagued me
All that haunted me

Personified, solidified
And barely alive.

My half-dead servant.

and Halloween child

So here, twisted in steel, and spoiled with red
your sunlight hide, smelling of death and fear,
they crushed out your throat the terrible song
you sang in the dark ranges. With what crying
you mourned him! - the drinker of blood, the swift death-bringer
who ran with you so many a night; and the night was long.
I heard you, desperate poet, Did you hear
my silent voice take up the cry? - replying:
Achilles is overcome, and Hector dead,
and clay stops many a warrior's mouth, wild singer.

Voice from the hills and the river drunken with rain,
for your lament the long night was too brief.
Hurling your woes at the moon, that old cleaned bone,
till the white shorn mobs of stars on the hill of the sky
huddled and trembled, you tolled him, the rebel one.
Insane Andromache, pacing your towers alone,
death ends the verse you chanted; here you lie.
The lover, the maker of elegies is slain,
and veiled with blood her body's stealthy sun.

"Croak, croak, croak,"
Thus the Raven spoke,
Perched on his crooked tree
As hoarse as hoarse could be.
Shun him and fear him,
Lest the Bridegroom hear him;
Scout him and rout him
With his ominous eye about him.

Yet, "Croak, croak, croak,"
Still tolled from the oak;
From that fatal black bird,
Whether heard or unheard:
"O ship upon the high seas,
Freighted with lives and spices,
Sink, O ship," croaked the Raven:
"Let the Bride mount to heaven."

In a far foreign land
Upon the wave-edged sand,
Some friends gaze wistfully
Across the glittering sea.
"If we could clasp our sister,"
Three say, "now we have missed her!"
"If we could kiss our daughter!"
Two sigh across the water.

O, the ship sails fast,
With silken flags at the mast,
And the home-wind blows soft;
But a Raven sits aloft,
Chuckling and choking,
Croaking, croaking, croaking:--
Let the beacon-fire blaze higher;
Bridegroom, watch; the Bride draws nigher.

On a sloped sandy beach,
Which the spring-tide billows reach,
Stand a watchful throng
Who have hoped and waited long:
"Fie on this ship, that tarries
With the priceless freight it carries.
The time seems long and longer:
O languid wind, wax stronger";--

Whilst the Raven perched at ease
Still croaks and does not cease,
One monotonous note
Tolled from his iron throat:
"No father, no mother,
But I have a sable brother:
He sees where ocean flows to,
And he knows what he knows, too."

A day and a night
They kept watch worn and white;
A night and a day
For the swift ship on its way:
For the Bride and her maidens,--
Clear chimes the bridal cadence,--
For the tall ship that never
Hove in sight forever.

On either shore, some
Stand in grief loud or dumb
As the dreadful dread
Grows certain though unsaid.
For laughter there is weeping,
And waking instead of sleeping,
And a desperate sorrow
Morrow after morrow.

O, who knows the truth,
How she perished in her youth,
And like a queen went down
Pale in her royal crown?
How she went up to glory
From the sea-foam chill and hoary,
From the sea-depth black and riven
To the calm that is in Heaven?

They went down, all the crew,
The silks and spices too,
The great ones and the small,
One and all, one and all.
Was it through stress of weather,
Quicksands, rocks, or all together?
Only the Raven knows this,
And he will not disclose this.--

After a day and a year
The bridal bells chime clear;
After a year and a day
The Bridegroom is brave and gay:
Love is sound, faith is rotten;
The old Bride is forgotten:--
Two ominous Ravens only
Remember, black and lonely.

© 2009 (Jim Sularz)

Quiet mounds of yellowed tailings and dead weeds whisper low.
And proud rusting relics telling tales of striking gold.
The rush from East, from North and South, by wagon, train or foot.
Days not all that long ago, in tall ships made of wood.

“A gold rush struck in’49, all quite by accident.
A burning fever that cut men to bone, in a sea of dingy tents.
Day and night, they toiled and tolled, many headed home without a cent.
But some packed out bags of glistening gold, and made a stop at "Buzzard’s Breath."

"The town’s mud logged street, deep with horse manure, bubbled like a shallow grave.
With a Sheriff’s office, a livery stable, and a church for souls to save.
And a fancy house, on a grassy knoll – sign read, “Madam Lil la ****.”
With soft, curvaceous ladies who mined for hearts – and gold of a different sort.

Didn’t take long before easy gold, was extremely hard to find.
And burly miners, tough as steel, moved in to hard rock mine.
With bloodied knuckles, dented hats, they blasted at a furious pace.
To find the gold, called the Mother Lode, yellow blood coursing through their veins!

The mine they worked was called “Long Shot”, the men thought that name a curse.
But the miners hankered for the handle, "Buzzard’s Breath”, and the mine’s name was reversed.
As luck would say, they held a royal flush, when they hit that horse-wide vein.
Of the purest gold, yet to be found, this side of the Pearly Gates.

Eyes wide as saucers, they were all in awe, everyone was filthy rich.
The miners should have all retired and should have cashed in all their chips.
But a man’s hard to figure, when his blood is yellow, and he’s stricken with a gold fever.
“Eureka! Boys, *** the dynamite and a whole lot more mining timbers!”

They mined that vein to the bowels of the Earth, and the heat increased by day.
"Buzzard’s Breath" became the hottest place, to Hell – the shortest way.
And then one day, the men never came back. – Hell must have jumped that claim.
Of the purest gold, yet to be found – that’s where the Devil mines today!”

Quiet mounds of yellowed tailings and dead weeds whisper low.
And proud rusting relics telling tales of striking gold.
The rush from East, from North and South, died a slow and quiet death.
Along with days of tall wooden ships, and the ghosts of Buzzard’s Breath.

The squat,
Yorkshire monk,
pulls on the rope
and tolls

the Angelus bell;
his smooth hands
allow
the rough rope

to rub against
his skin,
rough on smooth.
I flushed the latrines

of the abbey,
having cleaned
with a stiff brush;
I recall her

mouthing my fellow;
her dark eyes
closing
as a dying moon.

The old French monk
scythes the tall grass,
his cutting swoop wide,
a studied look,

a prayer moaned
inside.

I went to stay with an old schoolmate
In the village of Rushing Brooke,
I thought there wouldn’t be much to do
So I took a favourite book,
He said he’d only been there a while
For the cottage rent was cheap,
He’d needed to get away, he said,
But never could get to sleep.

His face was haggard, his eyes bloodshot
His hands would tremble and shake,
He said it was close to a fortnight since
He’d started to lie awake,
‘I get to the point I’m drifting off
When I hear that terrible knell,
A long slow tolling invades my sleep
From the church that has no bell.’

We sat up talking ‘til one o’clock
Then I made my way to bed,
But nothing invaded my sleep that night,
‘It won’t at first,’ he said.
‘There’s something wanders the street outside
In the hours before the dawn,
Clad in a cowl, or a hooded cloak
But it’s gone before the morn.’

From all that I saw of Rushing Brooke
The cottages were quaint,
They certainly had a timeless look,
Could do with a coat of paint.
The roads were rough with a pebbled look
But I saw no folk about,
I passed the Smithy and Fodder store
But the Blacksmith, he was out.

We walked on over to see the church
That was grim, and overgrown,
There’d not been a single service there
Since the Roundheads stormed the town,
But weeds grew up in the vestry, there
Were signs of an ancient fire,
And looking up we could see a space
Right under the old church spire.

‘That was the space they hung the bell
But the bell has long been gone,
The Roundheads carried it off, they say,
So it couldn’t toll for Rome.
The bell had tolled for the death of Charles
As his head fell under the axe,
The soldiers came for revenge in force
In one of their brute attacks.’

I kept him company every night
But I had to get some sleep,
For days I’d wake and I’d find him still
Awake in a crumpled heap.
I woke one time and I saw him stare
Through the window, into the night,
For there was a ghostly cloak and cowl,
It gave me a sudden fright.

And that’s when I heard the tolling bell
For the first time, that he’d said,
The bell from the church, that wasn’t there
Was tolling in my head,
I lay awake ‘til the sun came up,
Went out to greet the day,
But there the village had tumbled down,
Had long since gone away.

Only the marks of ancient roads,
Foundations that had stood,
There wasn’t a cottage left out there
Just an encroaching wood,
The church was standing among the trees
And our cottage, cracked and scarred,
Half of the roof was missing, and
The chimney lay in the yard.

We hurried away to the nearest town
And found an old-style Inn,
My friend had fallen asleep within
A moment of checking in,
He slept and he slept for two whole days
While I asked about the town,
‘What of the village of Rushing Brooke?’
But all that they did was frown.

The wife of the keeper of the Inn
Was tidying my room,
I asked her the same old question as
She worked there in the gloom,
‘I wouldn’t go near to Rushing Brooke
Not now, for a thousand pound,
That’s where the soldiers stole the bell
And mowed the villagers down.’

‘They say as the place is haunted by
The figure of a monk,
They burnt him alive inside the church
As he tolled the bell by the font.
He lived in a little cottage there,
The only one that stands,
I’ve heard some tell that they’ve heard the bell
And seen him, walk in the grounds.’

David Lewis Paget

Wisdom and Spirit of the universe!
Thou Soul, that art the Eternity of thought!
And giv’st to forms and images a breath
And everlasting motion! not in vain,
By day or star-light, thus from my first dawn
Of childhood didst thou intertwine for me
The passions that build up our human soul;
Not with the mean and ****** works of Man;
But with high objects, with enduring things,
With life and nature; purifying thus
The elements of feeling and of thought,
And sanctifying by such discipline
Both pain and fear,—until we recognise
A grandeur in the beatings of the heart.

      Nor was this fellowship vouchsafed to me
With stinted kindness. In November days,
When vapours rolling down the valleys made
A lonely scene more lonesome; among woods
At noon; and ’mid the calm of summer nights,
When, by the margin of the trembling lake,
Beneath the gloomy hills, homeward I went
In solitude, such ******* was mine:
Mine was it in the fields both day and night,
And by the waters, all the summer long.
And in the frosty season, when the sun
Was set, and, visible for many a mile,
The cottage-windows through the twilight blazed,
I heeded not the summons: happy time
It was indeed for all of us; for me
It was a time of rapture! Clear and loud
The village-clock tolled six—I wheeled about,
Proud and exulting like an untired horse
That cares not for his home.—All shod with steel
We hissed along the polished ice, in games
Confederate, imitative of the chase
And woodland pleasures,—the resounding horn,
The pack loud-chiming, and the hunted hare.
So through the darkness and the cold we flew,
And not a voice was idle; with the din
Smitten, the precipices rang aloud;
The leafless trees and every icy crag
Tinkled like iron; while far-distant hills
Into the tumult sent an alien sound
Of melancholy, not unnoticed while the stars,
Eastward, were sparkling clear, and in the west
The orange sky of evening died away.

      Not seldom from the uproar I retired
Into a silent bay, or sportively
Glanced sideway, leaving the tumultuous throng,
To cut across the reflex of a star;
Image, that, flying still before me, gleamed
Upon the glassy plain: and oftentimes,
When we had given our bodies to the wind,
And all the shadowy banks on either side
Came sweeping through the darkness, spinning still
The rapid line of motion, then at once
Have I, reclining back upon my heels,
Stopped short; yet still the solitary cliffs
Wheeled by me—even as if the earth had rolled
With visible motion her diurnal round!
Behind me did they stretch in solemn train,
Feebler and feebler, and I stood and watched
Till all was tranquil as a summer sea.

I came out of the north-west
Staggering from the storm
The surgeons had repaired my body
And my mind hung by one hinge
So I headed for the coast of Wales
To assume the healing rhythm of the sea
And breathe the briny air
Where no-one knew me
Nor called my worn out name
Sweet freedom in isolation

And so, in smiling solitude
I walked and smoked too much
Staring at the moody ocean
As we all inevitably do
As though it holds answers
And indeed it does
The answer is "being"

One hot but breezy day
I followed the coast from north to south
Not too far but far enough
Until I came upon a harbour
Tiny and insignificant
But a harbour nonetheless
With a clutch of small boats
Bobbing and swaying lazily
On the backwater slack water tide
And somewhere close by
A nautical bell tolled the rhythm
Of an endless heedless movement
And an oddly comfortable melancholy
Rocked me in it's arms
Lost and found
Beginning and end

In as much as everything matters
Though nothing matters much
This place was nothing to me
No more than countless others
But that harbour bell
So patient and so constant
Touched something deeper than knowledge
Perhaps it was the state of my health
Or the glowing heat of the day
But some vulnerable receptor
Vibrated to that gentle toll
I've been in many places in my life
And seen wondrous famous sights
All seared into my minds eye
But their memories will last no longer
Than the haunting harbour bell

                                                By Phil Roberts

The weighted press of measured steps on stair
accompanied by an echoed call to the familiar.
The first syllable of her name severed  midway,
yet it tolled long after the utterance rang out.
The comfort of routine;
tethers of association
snapped under the strain of realisation.
A mocking gift from forgetfulness...

...she left him..

Mechanical body shifts
fighting urges to hesitate and listen to her vanished sleeping breath.
Vacant the cold bedroom,
the chamber harbouring her scent on fabrics, pillow and scantly furnished dresser top.
Each sniff raw as salt on opened wounds.
She left
and left him
only remorseful residues
from the harvest
of three years and five months.

Verse, a breeze ’mid blossoms straying,
Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee—
Both were mine! Life went a-maying
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,
When I was young!
When I was young?—Ah, woeful When!
Ah! for the change ‘twixt Now and Then!
This breathing house not built with hands,
This body that does me grievous wrong,
O’er aery cliffs and glittering sands
How lightly then it flashed along,
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore,
On winding lakes and rivers wide,
That ask no aid of sail or oar,
That fear no spite of wind or tide!
Nought cared this body for wind or weather
When Youth and I lived in’t together.

Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-like;
Friendship is a sheltering tree;
O the joys! that came down shower-like,
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,
Ere I was old!
Ere I was old? Ah woeful Ere,
Which tells me, Youth’s no longer here!
O Youth! for years so many and sweet
’Tis known that Thou and I were one,
I’ll think it but a fond conceit—
It cannot be that Thou art gone!
Thy vesper-bell hath not yet tolled—
And thou wert aye a masker bold!
What strange disguise hast now put on,
To make believe that thou art gone?
I see these locks in silvery slips,
This drooping gait, this altered size:
But Springtide blossoms on thy lips,
And tears take sunshine from thine eyes:
Life is but Thought: so think I will
That Youth and I are housemates still.

Dew-drops are the gems of morning,
But the tears of mournful eve!
Where no hope is, life’s a warning
That only serves to make us grieve
When we are old:
That only serves to make us grieve
With oft and tedious taking-leave,
Like some poor nigh-related guest
That may not rudely be dismist;
Yet hath out-stayed his welcome while,
And tells the jest without the smile.

Out on the marsh on a lonely night
The wind soughs through his rags,
The hat that’s pinned to his painted face,
Flutters and soars, then sags,
His eyes are wide and his mouth is grim
As an owl is put to flight,
And nothing but shadows will venture there
For the Scarecrow rules the night.

And back in the manse in a window seat
The Parson’s daughter sits,
She stares at the fluttering coat-tails, but
In truth, is scared to bits,
She watches the sails of the windmill turn
And creak and groan in the gloom,
As clouds come stuttering over the marsh
In the rays of a Harvest Moon.

The father is out in the donkey cart
To tend to his aging flock,
He’s left Elizabeth waiting there
By the tick of the hallway clock,
But out on the moors and beyond the marsh
There rides one Highway Jack,
A frock coat topped with a bunch of lace
And a gold trimmed tricorne hat.

He’s whipped the horse to a lather
In a retreat from a new affray,
For the magistrates have gathered
Vowing to ride him down that day,
The redcoats wait in the village Inn
For the sound that they know too well,
When the curate sees the approaching horse
He’s to toll the old church bell.

But the curate lies in a drunken fit
On the floor of the old church nave,
And soon, by matins his soul will flit
From life to an early grave,
Elizabeth sits in the window seat
And thinks of the coin and plate,
As the highwayman dismounts, and ties
His horse to the manse’s gate.

He beats on the door, ‘Please let me in,
I’m weary and faint, that’s all.
I wouldn’t abuse your person, but
I fear my back’s to the wall.’
She leaves the seat and she slides the bar
For bracing the oaken door,
‘I dare not, sir, I fear for my life,
You’re safer out on the moor!’

Their voices echo across the marsh
Like fear, distilled in the night,
And something shudders out in the gloom
And lurches to left and right,
It seems forever, but now a sound
Tolls out, like a final knell,
For something, out in the church tonight,
Is tolling the steeple bell.

He barely makes it back to his horse
When the redcoats stand in line,
Their muskets fire a volley of shot
And his coat turns red, like wine.
They go to the church when the deed is done
To say, ‘You have done well!’
But the curate lies on the cold stone floor,
The Scarecrow tolled the bell!

David Lewis Paget

In the market-place of Bruges stands the belfrey old and brown;
Thrice consumed and thrice rebuilded, still it watches o’er the town.

As the summer morn was breaking, on that lofty tower I stood,
And the world through off the darkness, like the weeds of widowhood.

Thick with towns and hamlets studded, and with streams and vapors gray,
Like a shield embossed with silver, round and vast the landscape lay.

At my feet the city slumbered. From its chimneys, here and there,
Wreathes of snow-white smoke, ascending, vanished, ghost-like, into the air.

Not a sound rose from the city at that early morning hour,
But I heard a heart of iron beating in the ancient tower.

From their nests beneath the rafters sang the swollows wild and high;
And the world, beneath me sleeping, seemed more distant than the sky.

Then most musical and solemn, bringing back the olden times,
With their strange, unearthly changes rang the melancholy chimes,

Like the psalms from some old cloister, when the nuns sing in the choir;
And the great bell tolled among them, like the chanting of a friar.

Visions of the days departed, shadowy phantoms filled my brain;
They who live in history only seemed to walk the earth again;

All the foresters of Flanders,—mighty Baldwin Bras de Fer,
Lyderick du Bucq and Cressy, Philip, Guy du Dampierre.

I beheld the pageants splended that adorned those days of old;
Stately dames, like queens attended, knights who bore the Fleece of Gold;

Lombard and Venetian merchants with deep-laden argosies;
Ministers from twenty nations; more than royal pomp and ease.

I beheld proud Maximilian, kneeling humbly on the ground;
I behed the gentle Mary, hunting with her hawk and hound;

And her lighted bridal-chamber, where a duke slept with the queen,
And the armèd guard around them, and the sword unsheathed between.

I beheld the flemish weavers, with Namur and Juliers bold,
Marching homeward from the ****** battle of the Spurs of Gold;

Saw the fight at Minnewater, saw the White Hoods moving west,
Saw great Artevelde victorious scale the Golden Dragon’s nest.

And again the whiskered Spaniard all the land with terror smote;
And again the wild alarum sounded from the tocsin’s throat;

Till the bells of Ghent resounded o’er lagoons and **** of sand,
“I am Roland! I am Roland! there is victory in the land!”

Then the sound of drums aroused me. The awakened city’s roar
Chased the phantoms I had summoned back into their graves once more.

Hours had passed away like minutes; and before I was aware,
Lo! the shadow of the belfry crossed the sun-illumined square.

It used to live on the hilltop
where a lone bell tolled
by the temple:
but the Deity is long gone
and the bell mourns
in the valley wind on empty
afternoons, now.

I went searching for it:
in late summer, the koel
would sunder open the vaults
of heaven and bring
some down for us mortals
haunted by death.
The koels are long gone now.

Peace,
peace.

Lady siting silent in the evening
staring vacant into the sky,
after a day of labour:
can you give some to me?

I thought it was in education.
But that is stored now, in
almirahs where moths
eat way what humidity cannot.

I thought it was in a position.
But they don't matter, now
a ladder ascending
to nowhere,
vanishing mid-air.

Old man, smiling past hope
that has broken like
your lost teeth:
can you give some to me?

I asked the urchin
playing in the ditch after the rains,

he said: 'follow me, I know where
it lives', and he led me to
a ***** pond lined with plastic
and all our civilization's refuse,
and jumped in.

I returned, disgusted.

I have often turned within my grave to ponder of the reason why
Upon the date of my birth, you took me to your secret hide

Underneath an aspen tree within the deadest of nights
You took to me like a moth to a ball of flickering light

With the devils own smile plastered upon your face and the slightest of hand
You produced a sanguineous jar of hearts and an ominous jar of black sand

You grasped my hands in your work enured and fairly calloused paws
Looked me in the eyes, and told me to forever leave my pale hands raw

"Never soil your untouched hands, your hands and eyes you shall avert'
"Never bruise, nor ever hurt, nor shall they be ever touched by dirt,

"Never touch a rose, nor touch a bee, as danger is an all you see,
"Close your eyes my little darling, and all of life shall be but a dream."

With the trust of a mothers child, I kept my eyes tightly squeezed
Wished upon the star within the midnight sky, wavering in the breeze

Held my hands up to my chest, hoping the fluttering and staggered slips
Not to be seen by your face within the light of moon as from the sun it dines and sips

Of a heart that had only once been given to me and should have forever stayed mine
But the greed inside all mens' hearts want, and reaches out to grasp a young new 'hind'

With another slight of those calloused hands, you took my life for your own pleasure
And stole what was rightfully derived as mine; a beating heart, you took your leisure

A working mind, once a clock, now fully had come to a skidding stop
You took my bones and my teeth and used them as a fertilizing crop

The very worst thing that you did, you took my pride when you took my skin
Shaved off clean with a diamond edged razor and worn as if you were mockeries twin

Burried underneath that beautiful aspen tree, I've been given the time to remold
But my life had been stolen, the soul forced out before the bells had tolled

In the time it had taken for my pieces to remold, I had realised something then and there;
There were always things that were meant to go untold, but the truth is ringing upon the open air

You wanted more than what was offered and had bitten off all you could chew
But if I'd known back then what I know now, I'd know real good men only come in few

It was a Saturday night  in the park
his trees were singing
out of tune
his clay pigeons needed to come out
of his closet
for he was parked
on a stool
at his favorite watering hole
amongst a full house
where pairs beat singles
and there he was
shooting blanks
drowning in his sorrows
on his nine lives of lowlife
hoping for a sitting duck in despair
the kind that waddles right up to the Romeo's
with suspense in their hearts
and spontaneity in their wings
a cackle
that he can tackle
to take home
to his garden bed
for him to be fed
but what he got
was for not, naught, knot
wistful thinking
sitting in a bar sinking
for the jukebox played a broken record
finding love in the wrong places
and the joke squarely was on him
for thinking, he could round the bases
looking no further than the escape of his glows
or a crutch of decoys
and sitting ducks
for he was no Romeo
yet
there he was still, like steel,
a stole away in society
forlorn, preserved
like mamas mothballs tucked away
in basement storage
squandering the forage
for there were no triple treats
tonight for him
or forever sounds grim
for his reality check gone dim
or
no eye candy
for his heart beats
no picnic
for his ****
and all the bottled whiskey
could not drown out his pain
as his eyes were slain
as the sitting ducks turned
from his fantasy corner
phantomlike
and though
he's sitting at the bar, a loner
reminded that in cards of life
pairs beat singles
and in his worn hand
familiarly holds a lonely joker
for it's like he tries
and its
like his sitting ducks
are like hoofed deer
and his little sweets,
are spooked
hoofing
away from his
now darken forest
like red ants at his picnic
and the gleam in his eyes turned
to the poorest
its
its
as if his life and watering hole
was condemned
his garden bed cut at the stem
it is as if he has a red vest on
and a rifle don
and all the hoofed deer
panic
looking at him in fear
like he's manic
or maybe it's his eyes
that hold dark skies
he orders another double
trouble
for what else is there to do
on his Saturday night
than to sit in a bubble
forever sounds grim
but sing him a sweet hymn
he says please
to wit as he steals peeks
at the bartenders triple treats
like a bee to a hive
his joker still strikes a beat
if only he can find a bolster
for his gun needs a holster
and a deer in the headlights
would be hard to find
the confession now told, tolled, towed
through tears
the guy in the bar window
is me, sitting
resigned

Logan Robertson

10/18/2018

<6:30 AM.  Sun May 28 2023>

An internal clock stirs within,
a full fledged conscious conscience rings in,
like a silent alarm at a bank being robbed.

Various devices inform, each with a
different measurement cup/stick, that I,
have slept exactly seven hours which,
pleases, as I am queried,

How do you feel?

Fully refreshed!

my choice today,
most apropos,
for now awake, I begin to:

compose myself.

In the ordinary, is the where that
I have oft found poetry,
not to mention love and other good things,
walk the house, north to south, east to west,
under weakish, not really high in the sky,
sun rays break thru the tree cover and create
a checkerboard of light and dark patches
for children to play upon, if any were/where here.

All seemingly is well.
The rabbits beneath us,
are sleeping in,
because after all,
it is Sunday.

But I digress; composition implies order, form,
even malice aforethought, so as an artist,
knowing the world is yet extant,
and I, yet am in one piece(s),
make coffee for two,
humming an old tune of similar ilk,
re tea

But every human has some master,
and mine the machine!

Want coffee? Hah!
Empty the grounds!
Not enough.
Now, Refill the Tank!
What! More?
Fill the beans!

Suffice! Relent!
I am human, you machine, and I demand coffee.

At last, the impolite machine, that knows not ‘please’ nor
‘thank you,’ nary its native ‘your welcome’ in its native Swissie Deutsche (Keine Ursache!).  All very Swiss, and businesslike,
doth relent, making a very fine cup of coffee.

I shall not trouble you with various side trips,
that though common to all humankind, but
provoke two sister thoughts in quick succession.

A modified abbreviated prayer:

Dear Lord, Yo! You have brought me to
the beginning of a new day,. Thanks a lot!

I skip over this remainder part, my excuse?

Too many words!

(“As the world is renewed fresh and clean, so I ask You to renew my heart with Your strength and purpose. Forgive me the errors of yesterday and bless me to walk closer in Your way today.”)

The other thought, a reciprocal to my gratitude.

Why in hell do our bodies age, ache, snap & crackle, Buddy?
perhaps a revision of this policy is in order, Would it upset
some vast eternal plan if my body never tolled my years
in lines of degeneration, waves of visible and invisible erosion,
or at least make coffee a magical, healing restorative elixir?

Nope.  

The usual sneering silence of just be happy you’re alive
etc., etc., etc. and etc.

Don’t think I am asking for too much. just a little tinkering…

More to write, but I chastise myself with:

Too many words!

Leave off here, though my misadventures
and adventures too, yield up inspirational
hymns galore, and batches of familiar plaints,
that is my inalienable human right to express
to nobody else, in particular,

But you.

For in so many ways, we journey together
though our paths, locales, and courses are
so vastly different, in my mind, we are together,
in the here and now, and in the forever future,
we must continue to share and share alike,
our words….

At six o’clock of an autumn dusk
With the sky in the west a rusty red,
The bells of the mission down in the valley
Cry out that the day is dead.

The first star ****** as sharp as steel —
Why am I suddenly so cold?
Three bells, each with a separate sound
Clang in the valley, wearily tolled.

Bells in Venice, bells at sea,
Bells in the valley heavy and slow —
There is no place over the crowded world
Where I can forget that the days go.

Someone tolled me once;
'you must first love yourself
before you can love someone else'.

I can't scream loud enough
that they are wrong, that it
is all to easy for a woman to
feel red and purple sunsets
for a man and yet her sky's
are ever clouded.

She knows that everything
he is, is everything she doesn't  
deserve. That when their soul
was ripped apart in heaven
before being sent to earth he
was given everything good.

I love your light, your soul
is ever bright.
You balance my dark, but
forgive me when I can not
love myself the way you
want me to.
Forgive yourself for not
being able to change me.
God forgive us for not
being able to repair
the torn seams
of our
souls.

Bredon Hill

by A. E. Houseman

In summertime on Bredon
  The bells they sound so clear;
Round both the shires they ring them
  In steeples far and near,
  A happy noise to hear.

Here of a Sunday morning
  My love and I would lie,
And see the coloured counties,
  And here the larks so high
  About us in the sky.

The bells would ring to call her
  In valleys miles away;
'Come all to church, good people;
  Good people come and pray.'
  But here my love would stay.

And I would turn and answer
  Among the springing thyme,
'Oh peal upon our wedding,
  And we will hear the chime,
  And come to church on time.'

But when the snows at Christmas
  On Bredon top were strown,
My love rose up so early
  And stole out unbeknown
  And went to church alone.

They tolled the one bell only,
  Groom there was none to see,
The mourners followed after,
  And so to church went she,
  And would not wait for me.

The bells they sound on Bredon,
  And still the steeples hum,
'Come all to church, good people'--
  Oh, noisy bells be dumb;
  I hear you, I will come.

A bell tolled
through the fog at dusk
to summon passage
across the roiling waters.

Through the mist
a ferry appeared
but not the same as called -
afoul with death and sorrow.

With dread our forefathers
boarded ship and listened through
that storm filled crossing
to howling wind sung requiems
echoing from distant fields at
Manassus - Shiloh - Gettysburg.

When the gales had spent their fury
they disembarked in a new land
with both far less and more
than they left on the opposite shore.

*March, 2008

The words are washing away
Losing coherence
As the colors bleed from my rib cage
Leaving me grey and hollow
And the chill that follows
Gives me a sense of familiarity
Like an old friend come to play the part
When did we start flushing our dreams?

The knife's still in your hand
You try to wash me away
But I tend to stain
Tend to mark
When you try to rub me out

Can you truly erase a life?
Should you dare to try?
I'd like to know
Why the bell tolls
For me

The bell tolled for me

Death is often painful
I'm unfortunate to know
When your spirit is being torn away
When the last breath clings to your lips
When the light leaves your eyes
Life is but a breath from being over

Unbroken damsel of the water's edge,
poised as if she were living.
Weren't you crafted from gold, in the riverbed?

Never such a shining thing was born of mud:
Mirages for wings and clockwork for blood.

How fast did the moving hands that
tolled her final minute tick?
What eternal, turning clock
knew the second her wing-beats stopped?
And where’s the scratch that shows the place
death touched her glassy face?

She might have been a broach or pin
with diamonds on her silver skin,
who never had life in her hinges and bolts.

But there she lies
with twinkling compound eyes -

I came out of the north-west
Staggering from the storm
The surgeons had repaired my body
And my mind hung by one hinge
So I headed for the coast of Wales
To assume the healing rhythm of the sea
And breathe the briny air
Where no-one knew me
Nor called my worn out name
Sweet freedom in isolation

And so, in smiling solitude
I walked and smoked too much
Staring at the moody ocean
As we all inevitably do
As though it holds answers
And indeed it does
The answer is "being"

One hot but breezy day
I followed the coast from north to south
Not too far but far enough
Until I came upon a harbour
Tiny and insignificant
But a harbour nonetheless
With a clutch of small boats
Bobbing and swaying lazily
On the backwater slack water tide
And somewhere close by
A nautical bell tolled the rhythm
Of an endless heedless movement
And an oddly comfortable melancholy
Rocked me in it's arms
Lost and found
Beginning and end

In as much as everything matters
Though nothing matters much
This place was nothing to me
No more than countless others
But that harbour bell
So patient and so constant
Touched something deeper than knowledge
Perhaps it was the state of my health
Or the glowing heat of the day
But some vulnerable receptor
Vibrated to that gentle toll
I've been in many places in my life
And seen wondrous famous sights
All seared into my minds eye
But their memories will last no longer
Than the haunting harbour bell

                                                By Phil Roberts

The Banker's Fate

They sought it with thimbles, they sought it with care;
They pursued it with forks and hope;
They threatened its life with a railway-share;
They charmed it with smiles and soap.
And the Banker, inspired with a courage so new
It was matter for general remark,
Rushed madly ahead and was lost to their view
In his zeal to discover the Snark.

But while he was seeking with thimbles and care,
A Bandersnatch swiftly drew nigh
And grabbed at the Banker, who shrieked in despair,
For he knew it was useless to fly.

He offered large discount--he offered a cheque
(Drawn "to bearer") for seven-pounds-ten:
But the Bandersnatch merely extended its neck
And grabbed at the Banker again.

Without rest or pause--while those frumious jaws
Went savagely snapping around--
He skipped and he hopped, and he floundered and flopped,
Till fainting he fell to the ground.

The Bandersnatch fled as the others appeared
Led on by that fear-stricken yell:
And the Bellman remarked "It is just as I feared!"
And solemnly tolled on his bell.

He was black in the face, and they scarcely could trace
The least likeness to what he had been:
While so great was the fright that his waistcoat turned white--
A wonderful thing to be seen!

To the horror of all who were present that day,
He uprose in full evening dress,
And with senseless grimaces endeavoured to say
What his tongue could no longer express.

Down he sank in a chair--ran his hands through his hair--
And chanted in mimsiest tones
Words whose utter inanity proved his insanity,
While he rattled a couple of bones.

"Leave him here to his fate--it is getting so late!"
The Bellman exclaimed in a fright.
"We have lost half a day. Any further delay,
And we sha'n't catch a Snark before night!"

Fair is thy site, Sorrento, green thy shore,
  Black crags behind thee pierce the clear blue skies;
The sea, whose borderers ruled the world of yore,
  As clear and bluer still before thee lies.

Vesuvius smokes in sight, whose fount of fire,
  Outgushing, drowned the cities on his steeps;
And murmuring Naples, spire o'ertopping spire,
  Sits on the ***** beyond where Virgil sleeps.

Here doth the earth, with flowers of every hue,
  Heap her green breast when April suns are bright,
Flowers of the morning-red, or ocean-blue,
  Or like the mountain frost of silvery white.

Currents of fragrance, from the orange tree,
  And sward of violets, breathing to and fro,
Mingle, and wandering out upon the sea,
  Refresh the idle boatsman where they blow.

Yet even here, as under harsher climes,
  Tears for the loved and early lost are shed;
That soft air saddens with the funeral chimes,
  Those shining flowers are gathered for the dead.

Here once a child, a smiling playful one,
  All the day long caressing and caressed,
Died when its little tongue had just begun
  To lisp the names of those it loved the best.

The father strove his struggling grief to quell,
  The mother wept as mothers use to weep,
Two little sisters wearied them to tell
  When their dear Carlo would awake from sleep.

Within an inner room his couch they spread,
  His funeral couch; with mingled grief and love,
They laid a crown of roses on his head,
  And murmured, "Brighter is his crown above."

They scattered round him, on the snowy sheet,
  Laburnum's strings of sunny-coloured gems,
Sad hyacinths, and violets dim and sweet,
  And orange blossoms on their dark green stems.

And now the hour is come, the priest is there;
  Torches are lit and bells are tolled; they go,
With solemn rites of blessing and of prayer,
  To lay the little corpse in earth below.

The door is opened; hark! that quick glad cry;
  Carlo has waked, has waked, and is at play;
The little sisters laugh and leap, and try
  To climb the bed on which the infant lay.

And there he sits alone, and gayly shakes
  In his full hands, the blossoms red and white,
And smiles with winking eyes, like one who wakes
  From long deep slumbers at the morning light.

Do not be afraid
She heard him say
“I am here to hold you dear”
Her stillness became acquiescence to her still
It’s nice to have you home for Christmas they may say
But her heart knows the better
The disgrace was still the footnote.
The night wind made a faint whisper
Telling her over and over
The time has come and gone
Forget the pain of evermore.
Dancing took her to a time
Her feet would fly and fly
Sweeping steps of every beat
To see those days that would go by;
Just to remember his words so dear
To clear her mind of pain
The slightest motion of his hand
To kiss the smiles she must be;
The sound reverberated through the crisp autumn air
Klung, klung, klung of the wood
Reminding her he was there.
She remembers his words.
As the faint breeze lifted her veil
But the face she saw was the one captured of long ago;
With black skirts and pine needles that she wrote
The songs were sung to her heart
Etched forever more this day
With colored hair ribbons all so new
Ponytails askew;
He took her hand to strange places that were so few
On Saturday nights to kiss the kiss
She remembers the words he spoke
The bell tolled once and then twice she heard
Sound exploded and glass flew.
As her life fell around her like needles ever so slightly,
The pain of it all so gone
Just to remember the words he spoke;
The farther and farther he tolled
The longer and longer she was gone
So now the years have passed
The pain is as she remembers
And the WORDS HE SPOKE
Was so light
That it still tore her heart.

AS SHE REMEMBER HIS WORDS THIS NIGHT.

BY: POETESS Debbie Brooks

Toad sand and frog pebbles,
warted rocks kicked and toed.

Tease the ocean with chocolate dipped feet,
spiced and salted teas.

Taper off mid-sentence, paragraphs tepid
long arms and zebra stripes, a crosswalk tepir.

Tocsin alarm clocks poison innocent bystander’s sleep,
slipping things in their drinks, filling their ears with toxin.

Tie a scarf around the forehead
of the middle child. Teach them beginning syllables of Thai.

Throes and spasms of overachievers
motivate for longer strides, faster throws.

Tense shoulder muscles
hide in sleeping bags, badly pitched tents.

Told injuries snuck in when the door opened,
we heard the miniature silver bells as they tolled.

Ticks count every second second, punctuated by tocks.
With each, a twitch, conscious nervous tics.

Titan tool boxes hold spare screws,
on Coeus’ threaded axis, we spin and tighten.

Terne sardine cans filled with mercury,
pollute our science tests, killing tern.

Tied red string around our pinkies so we don’t forget
when to go to the beach looking for clams at low tide.

Tacks pin talented teens to cork boards,
alongside instructions on regretting the harmonised sales tax.

Tire prints border the country,
left by jeeps that never tire.

Tails directing orchestras,
swarms of swan swim, tattling and telling tales.

I will always remember the moment we met.
(Haunting woodlands in springtime, your slim silhouette)
The glint in your eyes sparked a tempest at dawn
overwhelming the dreams of a slumbering fawn.

I will always remember your singular smile
(Fusing fantasies, fancies and phantoms the while)
when I brought you a daisy, then fled from the room,
weaving dizzy designs on a mystical loom.

I will always remember first touching your hand.
(Like the wing of a sparrow, frail fingers were fanned)
With my heartbeat aflutter, I jittered with joy -
on the surface, a man, though inside still a boy.

I will always remember the sound of your laugh
(Merry mermaid amused in a summer sea bath)
as we strayed 'long the strand, for a moment, alone,
with your tresses a’ tousle and tumbled and blown.

I will always remember your breath on my skin
(Seeking castles in chaos, a spirit in spin)
as you drew me aside and our tongues first entwined -
tangled twists of amour had begun to unwind.

I will always remember the fires of love.
(Shades of autumn ablaze in the tree leaves above)
Crazy passions ignited whenever we lay
painting stars in the night with the dazzle of day.

I will always remember the nightingale's tune.
(Divinations awash neath a ruddy blood moon)
When we kissed to its cadency, laughed as we danced,
lurking lanterns in limbo forged shadows enhanced.

I will always remember the shattering knell -
(Wanton words tolled in winter...  ‘Adieu, dear... farewell’)
just a note near a nook where so often we slept
which I read and reread and reread while I wept.

Would you call me a criminal if I did something wrong,
you can't blame it for the way I was born.
I trespassed into private property where I'm not allowed,
the police were called which was all that I can endure.
Would you call me a criminal if two police officers had to drive me home,
to get me away from the trouble that might foam.
Would you call me a criminal if I said I went back,
they called the police again,
then I ran on a different track.
I got caught on the way by two police cars,
they put me in the van and drove me to the station behind bars.
Then we got to the station where an officer asked me questions,
but I refused to answer and tolled lies which ended up in ruins.
I am a criminal as I was in trouble with police six times,
the only way I know how to express this is in these words and rhymes.