Prelude

Today is the day, the day after you. The day after innocence. The distance is unbearable.  I burn for you; my life here is dying without your love, your nature.  Inner thoughts huddle, lucidity absolves muddle. The ice prevails; we were content with the "given" in sensation's quest.  I and the other perceivers were left to tour the labyrinth during your mysterious nocturnal appearances.  I can feel the taste of your skin against my mouth, you colourise my monochromatic dreams. These rough decisions plague me, and I am swathed in the cold light of clarity, maybe I should drop this jagged edge bound by this blade of many points of view.  Then, my choice made, though not ambiguous.  Silencing the prophetic, I am to follow you.

The Desert

This step forward, leads into the heat, and I am burnt inside, as I am out. Licked by the tongues of the ambers, all aglow with fire. But for one moment my mind begins to disperse again, to the maze, creating the pattern depicting how uncanny the fate I have given myself, then thwarted by sly humour. The artists of Hell set up easels of dunes in this the terrible landscape, where citizens find anxious pleasure preyed upon by savage bands of Hashashin.  You reassured me under a selfish sun, eased my soul, and eased my mind.  And when I am frayed with fear like today you follow my wayward lead unquestioningly.  You are closeted in the dark parts of my mind, supporting my fragility; and I press on.

The Sea

The need to quench this love is soon overtaken by the physical. My love, I would bite off my hands for you. Like an albatross or a whale, I would swallow you whole And keep you safe in my stomach; I love you that much; Surely that’s worth something. That crazy strength, beneath your calm veneer is the force that dances in my spirit. Your visage is what keeps me here on this quest.  As I lay here, floating toward you, I realise we stood there in the doorway of wasted time for too long, and my guilt at that gives me strength.  A slow circumnavigation is split by the lighthouse on the edge of the eclipse.  I gather myself and motivated by this blissful misery and I am lustful for drink.  Filling my mouth with the silt of many years is the only recompense received for my landing.

The Canyon

Only the tortuous sun can pervade these walls, these citadels of my own long prison. But this is nothing compared to your heart.  You caught me, brought me here to your heart, barb wired, iron-caged, yet blissful like a cureless criminal.  I am cuffed here, led forward of a memory of you. And from my wrists will come ants and tired chains.  I ask whoever loved that loved not at first sight?  All the things you ever imagined or dreamed, bits of glass and fear will pour from these important veins: You’ll see how much I love you then. Like a scorpion I would carry you on my back, My stinger poised, ready to kill; Oh, how you would love me then! Stooped, I wonder if trepanning will get you out so I can kiss you again.  But you are inside and there you remain, a woman asleep, mystery within mystery.  I dream: You draped by black velvet dress, from which you absent-mindedly in boredom remove burrs, until my lips touch your neck. A cold wind sweeps your thigh. Awake and shaking dreams from my hair the walls open and reveal the last.

The Mountain

Looking up, I’m not so sure why the sky bruises over these cliffs, these vulgarly rechristened tombs.  I want to be the hero, to crack open this mountain of time and hold strong your love.  Though the world, my flesh and the devil are my constant companions, I can still feel you.  As a withered moon sails a tempestuous sky, underfoot slate moves and foils my advance.  Something is stirring in the thick depths of my senses.  My fears, categorised at some earlier point, can only be emboldened and unified by the thought of your loss.  I am the polystyrene man.  A cracked open surface of obsidian black numbed by the madness you prescribe in such large doses.  I was forced to accept this crescendo of solitude, and I will fight to join with you again in a waltz.  The red features of the peak are lifted by the sun, and I am sated. I can see your image, a rarity played as a toy in my thought like the sound of your voice long after your disappearance, quite audible still in my mind.  There at the summit you are, my eyes sore and vision rippled with sweat I can see you. Standing at the base of the tree, mouth slackened, devouring a rose. It has been an age. The fruit is ripe. I hear it plop to the ground, it litters the world with its dank smell. You have been waiting for me to burrow myself into the earth, revolve, evolve and rise in a revolution song! My skin is as red as a northern rose. Pock-marks, blistered by the sun, the sapling is as hard as rock. Here is my hand for you to shake. Here is my voice, speaking so quietly.  Here is my love.