Cantos 1 (In progress)

Rain falls over
ash coated eyes
blinded by years of
kindling existence

Transgressions and apologies
burned hyacinth petals
until only smoldering karma remained
Ash heaped and dusty cinders blew
choking asphyxiated breath
Kismet flowers eclipsed
and Eden lay sodden and desolate

Clear skies offered no escape
from hellfire sun
Heat poisoning a scourge
to dry eyes and empty skies
Years of desolation, cloudlessness
turned Elysium to a wasteland,
defiling the world
Skin became cracked expansions
of rotting flesh
and bone graveyards
until only dust remained
From dust we were born from
and dust we died
to dust with stifled names
and dust with tormented lives

In the Hyacinth Garden
I was given a flower two years ago
holding it closely, the blossoming bud
full of life and perfection
April may be more cruel
than July or December
while shadows rise and set
and spring rains are gentle
and soothing
Holding the Hyacinth
before it became a
handful of dust,
fearing death by dryness
fearing death by oblivion.

In June rats crept
and the damp ground dried,
the throbbing streams followed
and the Sweet Rhineland
turned to desert
Dry mouths wait for rain
remembering what it was like
to be drunk
Tea leaves and coffee beans withered
famished and dehydrated
like knowledge and memories
and dry brains

my Hyacinth turned to dust

'si lunga tratta
di gente, ch'io non avrei mai creduto
che morte tanta n'avesse disfatta

Death became life and
life had died
Resigned from tears and
dark's stillness
in Death's Lotus Kingdom
From end to end
of constellations and cities
silence came after the bells hushed
and dry winds blew
dust and ash
Turn and change and birth and death
with sagacity, copulation
ignorance, happiness and labor
in between
Alone in dirt and death
cabins filled with photo albums
and the hearth of sins
burning from the brain

On the other side of dryness
the sun beat feverishly
in hollowness of the skull

In the Garden all ended
there was no speech
and there was no stir
but a desert and a wind
of dry years to come
and dry years already past

waiting for the shadows
in fetid air

    The world was silent
    at the hour of the Hyacinth's death
    and the hour of Jesus's death

This land is inherited
from sin of anger
I am not worthy of
tears and despair
and I am not worthy
of this tree
I am not worthy
of age and music and wine
Yew and whispers and ancient rhymes
from the wind in the Garden
where the Juniper Tree grows
Let me follow exile
from Elysium to the Cocytus,
from Eden to the Wasteland

In sin, salvation lost
Eden lost, from moment
to silence, to stillness of death
from old age to rot and bone
Forgive us now and at the hour of our death's

forget war and peace while
life falls apart;
dust to dust, bone to bone

And here Napoleon lies
the hero and the traitor
in tombs of dried Earth


Finding rains of
higher dreams and
salvation
Spring to summer
to fall
from desert to rain land
and rain land to desert
apple seeds to witherings
and loss to gain
There is tension and time
loss and lying and all that's
full of malice, wrath, grace
Cold rains fall in
sweltering whirling clouds
let me cry
and let me find the sea
from blind eye redeemed
and sandy earth renewed