catharsis


“we revel in that curiosity which brings our spirits to life and marvel in repentance at that
phenomenon which is beyond our ability to comprehend; astounded by the miracle of birth,
confounded by the morbid permanence (and extreme uncertainty) of death, before and
after which we know not what wonders to seek nor what horrors there breed...for we
humans do tend to confuse births and deaths as the respective beginnings and ends of life. 
but what is life?  what is existence as opposed to inexistence?  it is simply that which, in
life itself, we are never meant to know...it is that which were are meant merely to speculate
and ponder in our universal quest for its true meaning...it is that which we discover
through death itself.  perhaps then, it is death that provides the answer to the question of
life, and life the answer for death.”


Zero

this is where life is rumored to begin
from nothing
from the mortal soil we do flourish in
to the desert wasteland of death we sing
the sacred holy mantra
of existence

it is the birth of reality
and the end of the end
it is perfect
as a flaw
it is sacred
as a god
it is all the more reason to believe
though we know not in what

and in that rotten corpse of death we do seek
the unknown
we do believe that we are powerless
and therefore inherently submissive to that which we have never witnessed
in the half-life of our bones
where is there for a soul to roam?

i will tell my children
i believe
not in spire fairy tales
but in the truth i dare to know


One

to fear the changing
the children blooming...
the bodies decaying...

my reflection has never seen a mirror
...has never been so clear
my disembodiment laid vast across the endless expanse of time
all that is left between now and never

bottled up inside me
black and white and shining
up thru the sky and down around
the ground beneath my knees
my hands dirty with the afterbirth
of a tainted soul that thorned my breast
the sin that once washed me clean
now drained me empty
...and i cut
...and i hurt
...and i felt
and i knew wrath
and i saw its face
and it showed me how to learn
the way of its evil heart
with dungeons and demons and dragons galore
lurking in the shadow...made me so hollow...so shallow
but i’ve swathed my wounds and i just don’t want to bleed anymore

what is that with which my eternal damnation has burdened me?
what sins of mine be more unworthy than those for which i paid
the transgressions i am not to release while under vigilant holy eyes

but omnipotence has a way of prying wide the portal to the unknown
as omniscience has a way of knowing what lies there

and my reflection in a dirty mirror
my disconnection...


Two

thy sacred shrine of humanity
thy foolish beauty struck down where angels fall to earth
bitten by a cupid’s poison tooth
for his arrows did not fell the mighty blade

a solitary masher hybrid, one part lover and one part island
he smiled and told me that i would live forever
all the while it was closer to the truth i would never

damned with regret and remorse for all these bygone eternities
i sink into the wet mortal quicksand
cursed and staid and lost in vain
i let the angels fly down and...

bury me in the dirt
bury me with the worms
fall thy tears of mourning
clip these dysfunctional wings
sever these shackled suns
flesh like a fingernail
bones like a battered steel armor
soul burnt in lightning youth
fading in the twilight dew
despite the world i wanted
i placed my faith in that which i was given
in birth
i cried so much and i just don’t want to rain anymore
i loved my life
i loved...
the angel on the swing
back and forth she trailed...to and fro
closer and farther and closer still
as she drew her portrait on my heart
i loved...
the devil and his minions
they danced and sang around my bonfire
and made me laugh and wonder how could any human
make me forget myself
i loved...
the amber glow that skewed my solitude
and made it so i would never be alone

oh how the might of love so deftly moulds in the devil’s heart
how it lasts forever, though merely to thwart
the hopes that i had placed in its arms, as it lie naked before me
waiting for my last words to slip through its ears
“he with a heart shall speak of only what it whispers to his soul”


Three

o’ cursed wind what seeds you blow
within
where might they roam
but in this quiet resolution
as they lay me down to sleep
six feet
as they lay me down so deep
closer to the cold of the earth
down among denizens of stone
i wonder as i disappear beneath the dirt
what more shall this worldly doom lay low
all my life i did repent for every wrong
that fate has dealt me
every misfortune and grievance
every flaw that kept me from achieving everything
all that which chained me to reality

ugliness
frailty
asymmetry
discontent
fear
insecurity
misunderstanding
temperance
heartbreak
aging
mortality

how to push beyond my realm
when i’ll never see the smiling face of summer love
her smiling face in the summer sun?
do i dance the devil’s waltz
in believing that heaven is...?


Four

in counting the ways in which i had died
long before this
i could not for the life of me forget the spiteful and damning evidence
of self-withdrawal
how i saw in the mirror a face so alien
so putrid and withered that it could have only been my own
at that time and space
so distant from my grace

in a retrograde liaison with the beauty of another
it had dwindled and the
	change blinded me
dear oblivion i curse thee!

is it what i dare not reveal?
is it love which i’m not meant to feel?

weep for me, weep a stray thundercloud
in subtle amber skies
and if it be this rain i drink
so let me sink
a Titan shrine
of earthly weight
thus the mighty whelm my fate

destroy the world destroy the pain
but never see her face again
such is love but not the same


Five

...and i kiss
...and i kneel
...and i give
...and i steal
...and i sin
...and i wish for my blood to congeal
...and i lust
...and i peel
...and i thrust
...and i heal
...and i love
...and i die as if i were real

i want to remain a child untamed
a martyr of love
and a victim of fate

and i want to believe
and i want to belie
and i want to forgive
and i want to deny
and i want to grow wings
and i want to become
everything i once loved
as if that were enough

my fingers go numb
and my eyes start to blind
my glimpse of the sun
the last wish i’m denied

to live past my death
my lungs cannot breathe
the air cannot reach
this sky of eclipse
in living forever
i watch the sun grow
and i watch it explode
...and i burn
...and i choke
...and i learn
...and i hope
...and in the grey i am swallowed
from my mind to my soul
and in time may i find what i’d lost years ago

to thread me together...for an eternity i’ll sew
but why is forever?  i’m never to know




<< | notes | index