Floating behind me,
a sea of blue, an immense sphere
comprising all that I know,
adore and despise,
breathe and asphyxiate,
drink and drown.
Ahead, you glisten, in quiet peril
reflecting light, juxtaposed in endless black,
after reporting a problem, drifting away,
brave smile in your voice
unintelligible
at this growing distance.
“You’re too late,” you said,
while still in range,
the warmth in your voice
transcending the void,
inexplicably soothing
my chilly fingers
and frosty extremities.
“Oh shit,” I said,
profanely breaking protocol
as the aspect of you
slowly shrank to a point of light.
“I’m sorry,” I offered to the magnets
within the transmitter mic,
a vain effort to overrule
our physical plane.
“It’s ok,” you said tenderly,
reassuring neither of us,
us both ignoring the
depleting oxygen alarms.
“I’m on to my next waypoint.
We’ll have to rendezvous
at the next target window,”
you declare as if our time were not
fleeting, finite,
our fates fixed.
You disappeared beyond the thin blue line,
leaving me to contend with the enormity
of the pale blue light and
an hour of radio silence,
floating above our northern hemisphere,
tilting away, towards winter.
“You free?” your voice vibrated
into my anxious receiver
after a maddeningly long silence
as your glimmer emerged
from the far-side,
rising to rival Venus-glow
and moondust.
“Yes,” I replied quickly,
maneuvering towards a
rendezvous altitude.
“I’m listening. I’m here.”
Then everything went null,
no heat, no cold,
not even light or shadow or grey,
leaving us clasping onto nothing.
***
“Red spider lilies are bright summer flowers native throughout Asia. They are associated with final goodbyes, and legend has it that these flowers grow wherever people part ways for good. In old Buddhist writings, the red spider lily is said to guide the dead through samsara, the cycle of rebirth. Red spider lilies are often used for funerals, but they are also used decoratively with no such connotations.”
knowing is the loneliest part
(for it is knowing
that you are
alone)
it’s lighting the wick after dusk
(the wick’s initial spark
cutting through tangled
colorless murky thickets)
my lantern lights a moonless night
unknown banished from amber sphere
(my amber sphere is weak
and clearly finite)
margins of its influence dim
(for the margins are too frail to divine)
beyond lies entangled nothings
randomly pierced by pricks of light
(each nothing entangled
as knotted terrain; each pin-prick
of light, a home or villa)
each, a distant lonely lantern
(each lantern,
a wick’s spark,
cutting)
lighting a range; the loneliest part
(for the loneliest part
is in knowing they are
alone;
surrounded by loved ones,
they may not know it,
but they are,
utterly and completely
alone)
look to the sky and you’ll find more
of lanterns lit eons ago
(eons later,
their light dots darkness
like notes from sheet-music)
each one a voice; an unheard song
living verse that died without bridge
(for the living verse we hear
leads to a divine bridge,
a cosmic chorus of a song
heard in its entirety only by
the Infinite,
the Alpha,
and the Omega)
unrehearsed, the ballad plays on
its meaning dims where our light ends
knowing is the loneliest part
Two dozen or so of intrepid stock
have seen the far-side with their own two eyes
a vastness and a full-body away
the furthest a man has ventured apart
“Where are you?” she asked, with penny for trade
soft lamp painting crescent upon her face
within arm’s reach, I would answer with touch
feeling’s believing, whenever we lie
Those men could only boldly go so far
detached, yet still tethered by their baggage
toting food, water, their breathable air
carbon scrubbers, to stop self-poisoning
“Where you going?” he asked, “party’s this way”
I’d be there soon, I lied, convincingly
insulated from the December chill
I yield my toxins to the evergreens
Apollo wears many hats ardently
His archetype arcs winding remote course
an arm’s length of two-hundred thousand miles
rising alone, each on this lonely earth.
***
The clip below isn’t related to the poem, but it fulfills my obligation to mention the holiday season. I hope you’re all having a fulfilling christmahaunakwanzaka, or whatever.
Two new high school grads
our duet, playing at probing,
experimental love;
clumsily grasping
at the third rail,
illuminating our
respective darkness,
calling the freshly found
fool’s gold
love eternal.
II.
Victims of circumstance, we
circled the idea as
adults consenting at this
scandalous dispelling of intent, this
instinctive discontent
sucking at the plea; a need
we’d already met
in spirit if not deed, she,
splayed and braced
for our forbidden crossing,
forever eroding a
gold-pressed
promissory note
as false idol.
III.
Never bothered catching her name;
would’ve fumbled it away anyway
in the aftermath of two bored barflies
stalling to return to our respective
counterfeit lives, finding life and little
deaths pressed between, rubbing for wishes,
but granted only golden gilded-guilt.
IV.
Last night with her was…
last night was…
it was… have you ever
in all your
quarter-century-plus of life
been so sure of someone,
so secure in her warmth,
so open to your own vulnerability
so overeager to overflow,
to explode,
to lose containment of self,
spilling onto
and into her essence
until you forget
where you end
and she begins? Like… you know…
uhm… like two novice glassblowers
playing in molten golden sands,
you both know it’s real and urgent
and wonderful, and powerful and… and…
…and inevitably,
one or both of you
will still shatter it
once it cools.
Anyway,
it was like that
with her.
V.
There was something
within this sad, soulful
old-soul lonely eyes
that fleetingly
stole her soul
from her fiancé
for an afternoon delight
that never happened; that was
her story anyway after
entering a bachelor’s loser-loft,
asking for a glass of water
she never drank a drop of,
spilling it on the night-stand
next to her thirst and
a certain creaking
secret-spilling mattress
and I can’t say if anything
she moaned into my ear
was gospel, but truth is,
sometimes
seeking that golden sandy fullness
leaves us spent, wrought
with emptiness.
VI.
Neither of us
are in the mood,
molecules moving
a bit slower with age
and still,
catching me
admiring her hips,
she wiggles a spark my way,
igniting knowing smirks
encircling in decaying orbits,
concentrically spinning
towards collision
saying inflammatory things like,
“I thought you were sleepy?” and
“What you wanna do?”
with knowing grins,
knowing the answer
before it begins with
clumsy grasping of our third rail,
transmuting darkness into
golden hues.
***
Initially, I was going to skip this one and just exist within my depression for a minute, but then I began reading everyone’s steamy contributions, and as Bjorn predicted, I became inspired for some reason. *heh*
Passion and sexual desire are often their own reward, but I thought it might be interesting to examine the fact that often these desires don’t exist within a hermetically-sealed bubble. Sometimes indulging is great and the circumstances wonderful, and sometimes the whole sultry exercise may be wrought with symptoms of a deeper need.
No judgments here! Lord knows I’m not qualified to judge anyone. I just thought it might be interesting to play with circumstances.
I enjoyed writing for this prompt. It pulled me from my doldrums for a bit. 🙂
you were acting unruly
willfully testing boundaries
as I patiently corrected
your older sister mocked you
and so I scolded her too
gently, sans needless cruelty
not as I had been brought up
but as I have learned to nurture
cause “know better, do better”
you and your big sis smile warmly
thanking me for caring enough-
I awake to dark cold silence
reality is your absence
your step-sis is a stranger
I’m a faded family picture
ignorant to your hopes and dreams
I’m bone-cold in black spaces
that will never know warmth again
but I deserve this mild penance
for failing to fight for you
I pray that moonlight blesses you
bloom from the many moons I missed
Hephaestus’ Waste & Cosmic Rubble 