Tag Archives: existentialism

Reverie

I am content in the sunlight
a thousand blank pages waiting
but without any cause to fight,
for my attention. Not needing;
necessity is self-defeating;
but there- available all the same.
The time left us is only wanting,
this life having finally been tamed.

The day drifts away but it is still bright,
a lifetime of mournful shadows fading
behind a long legacy of delight;
decades of fruitful creating,
the love of those that are liberating,
curiosity like an open flame
from fire to fire, always leaping.
Never quiet is my soul’s refrain.

Overtime

With the coffee that they like,
shaved off the bean like chocolate moose;
a foggy night of swirls rolling off the spoon.
That kind of early.

I need to be there.

People will remember if I’m not,
hold it against me, resent me.

How do I barricade my home office?
It’s a bedroom, no need to barricade.
                                  Supposedly.

Just need food and drink for two,
so when they come for me,
            [They will come – are coming]
                    we’ll live!

          Better than we did when we had to work
all the time,
                  coming in early.

Is a locked door enough to hold them off;
    the door between the day and night,
                      between dreams and reality,
                                  between consciousnesses?

                      I hope so.
                      I hope so.
                I don’t want to die like this,
          early.

The Maples of Vermont

A spike and hammer,
a bucket
unevenly distributed.
The sun means nothing but light,
A bright pylon amongst the clouds,
but its back is turned all the same;
giving its warmth to anyone else.

The freeze isn’t gone,
merely hiding amongst the shadows.

One tree,
prouder than the others, brighter;
stands tall-
an ambassador to the sky,
speaking for the earth of its roots,
or so it seems. Its arms fanned out
in a skeletal embrace.

The leaves are gone,
but the essence inside thrives.

The metal placed against the bark
causes no response,
not that anything is left to shake free.
What is needed is underneath,
a few blows away,
and then-
                  it slowly seeps,
unable to contain itself.

Later we burn most of it away,
so all that is left of that bitterness
is sweet.

Anguish

Two chiral figures stand opposed
divided by a heavy moment,
hands clasped to keep one another in place;
white craters consuming the digits,
tapering off to olive arms
that too quickly sink beneath tufts of fabric.

Though their pose is static,
their faces tremble;
the unseen weight within
grinding against them,
excavating the innocence left
of the husks they’ve since become.

A discernible history revealed,
with careful examination,
exhaustion of the senses,
sacrificed for lucidity,
acceptance.

It- emerges from the void,
like a fluke over the stern;
not even the depths,
a simple hint of the darkness,
where all things find their origin.

Two chiral figures
opposed
forever.

Cthulhu

Weak kneed they fall in their seats,
the tendrilled god rises.
Bright like starshine,
dark as the crushing void;
it is everything and nothing in concert.

From false fire it reaches out to them,
entombs them in eel like appendages;
not for wont,
there is no desire there,
impartially-
as a thresher to an arm amongst the wheat.

Such demeanor leaves them unafraid,
only-
awestruck by the breadth of its maw;
all those sharp teeth polished
reflecting back at them everything they want to see.
It is only its nature to eat,
theirs to be devoured;
taste nothing.

The Dirt

The dirt, brittle cracks exposed,
hidden beneath flowers in rows, and rows, and rows-

begs for the darkness that hides the sun’s rising,
the labor gestating beyond the horizon.

Let the torrent wash over those wounds,
like sand over the dessert dunes;

let it fill the countless spaces between-
make them whole, placid, serene.

Rationalize the absurd landscapes
with a throng of rivers, ponds, and lakes;

though the myriad of cracks remain,
the water gives the earth an even plain-

stable enough for all the life we know
to drink deep and grow, and grow, and grow.

A Lament

I regret the tragedies that broke me,
the quiet moments after, parsing thoughts,
finding solace when I should have suffered,
and, at last, forgetting the lesson learned.

I regret mysteries I did not see,
those theaters of war where I should have fought,
the responsibilities I deferred,
and not recognizing what I had earned.

I regret not letting my anger be,
becoming the anxiety it sought,
not heeding the advice that was conferred,
and ignoring the peace that I so yearned.

I regret thinking time was like the sea,
capricious waves in which we were all caught,
a purity otherwise unperturbed,
and not an ocean, overfished and spurned.

Nuance

Most of this is empty space;
the parts we recognize are our own.
Drawing lines to define the void,
make it digestible,
before it gets away from us.

All of it is exploding.
Omnidirectional fire
in a panicked escape
from itself or any purpose in its future;
circumventing speed for scale
while we just try and catch up.

What can we possibly expect?
Swimming around in noble gasses,
breathing fire and using the ash
to write equations or trace shadows.

When the mouth of the cave has closed,
all that we know will be darkness;
but most of this is empty space,
so perhaps there is still some truth in that.