With glassy eyes you ask me,
What I am,
I am you,
All of you,
I am that hunger in your breast,
The puppeteer holding your strings,
I am the primordial ooze from whence you came,
I am that voice in your head,
That which raises your fist to another,
I am the dark shapes in your periphery,
Those whom make your pulse race,
I am each butterfly wing removed,
I am no theory,
I am intrinsic human nature,
Call me chaos.
It’s all a performance,
All of it,
Each breath wears a top hat and cape,
Shuffling onto a stage,
There are no volunteers here,
Only a captive audience,
But the tricks are played regardless,
Global sleight of hand,
Slicing maidens in twain,
Pulling the heads of rabbits from hats,
Smoke and ash and mirrors,
And at the end,
No applause is heard,
A grim reaper is drawn,
Is that your card?
I remember as a child,
Every occasion the hour struck due,
And that resounding tone would emanate,
I would shiver,
Knowing that time had stolen a breath,
And it’d continue even without earshot,
It was that antique grandfather clock,
That accursed authority on time,
With a pendulum of meteorite iron,
I remember it even now,
It’s stature like a judge at court,
It was no humble timekeeper,
But Father Time in oaken design,
As if possessing this apparatus,
Ticking in his voice,
It scared me,
For whom else on this plane,
Could foresee one’s end?
We all have addictions,
Our personal highs,
They’re the best sedatives for the world,
I think we all have that one thing,
That prime compulsion,
That siren attraction,
A chime in the back of your head,
Do you too hear this call?
Is it the rush of nicotine?
The bottle or keg?
Maybe it is the pixels onscreen?
Perhaps the euphoria of narcotic oblivion?
Or the praise of brownnosers online?
As many fixations as orbs in the sky,
We all seem to hold a facet of this blight,
It’s a human defect,
There is no shame in it,
Not really,
We endure in our own ways,
That compulsion is a crutch,
Though it too can destroy us.
This work is complete,
Another night at the forge,
Though I remember naught,
As if rising from a trance,
My vision returns to clarity,
As I gaze at the page,
Assessing the words that I’ve spilled,
I don’t recognise myself,
It is like somebody else wrote them,
Some imposter in my midst,
Slicing my own vellum,
Dripping my own ink,
A man in my face painted inhuman,
Wielding my hands like props,
Raising these poems like the undead,
Though if I can’t recall my own art,
Could he be the true artist?
This imposter,
And am I the fraud?
The elements do speak to us,
Though we rarely heed their words,
Do you not hear the rage in an inferno?
The rhythmic dirge of the tides?
The grumbles of the tectonic shifts?
Their intentions are clear as ice,
But what of the wind?
Changeable and fickle,
The most mercurial of all,
She can only be translated by a wind chime,
It’s soft clinks offering phrases and tones,
Little shells tapping against bark,
Bucolic words as it sways,
A quaint little apparatus,
Made of string and shaped wood,
Only that can allow the wind to speak,
To converse,
And not just howl.
I finally escape sleep,
The sun gave me the key,
But some things did not escape with me,
Those things I called my wits,
Straight lines and connections,
Knowledge and logic,
Those things that make sense,
Lost to the nights ice,
Still captive to the dark,
On droll mornings like this,
My head is empty,
A fool has been spawned,
And oh that sorry dullard,
He is me.
Why is it,
When the sky finally smiles,
When fortune finally curtsies,
I’m preparing already for the next gale?
Am I just jaded?
Seeing everything through cynical goggles?
The conductor in my brain disputes,
In his emerald tailcoat he says,
There’s a problem for every solution,
A puzzle box for every paradise,
It can’t be right,
But the argument holds water,
Why is it so hard,
Despite all the evidence in the world,
To trust in a good thing?
It may be odd to say,
But it’s undeniable,
My soul is for sale to the right patron,
My affection,
My heart,
A paltry yet honest luxury,
Not in financial terms of course,
We’re not talking the flesh market,
But for somebody to proffer sufficient warmth,
Genuine connections,
To be yours and you mine in turn,
To buy me as a partner and not a puppet,
Over the years,
If only to protect my tarnished edges,
After each hurt,
Every time I’ve been left in the cold,
The internal price has inflated,
The shop doors are bolstered,
The years grind by too fast,
If you are to take me for granted,
Or not trade in good faith,
Don’t be shocked or hurt,
When you can no longer afford my soul,
Or are denied service altogether.
At times of crippling dilemma,
At times like these,
I trek along the coastline,
White cliffs and shingle beaches,
Counselled by the salty air,
I’m caught between two paths in life,
The land and the sea,
The status quo and the unknown,
The stagnation of the tilled earth,
Or the unbridled horizon of the blue,
Each has its quandaries,
The dirt is safe and secure,
The ocean is unmapped and replete with krakens,
The surging waves warn against one,
The crash of scrapyards and exhaust the other,
I’m on the briny fringe of each life,
Watching sunrises and sunsets,
Unsure which voyage to take,
Do I walk inland or soar on the tide?
Only the coastline presents the choice.
WorldofHarley 