The tide sweeps over me
And I feel Nature's remote embrace
The only love I'll ever know
Too much has been denied
Too many have paraded in front of me
Teasing, taunting, cavorting like interior decorators
Laughing at me, mocking my truths
With hopeful lies
And I sink in the despair
Brought on by capricious wiles
Some give up too easily what should be theirs
The fortunate groom blames his inadequacy on me
And I sink into melancholy peregrinations
To all too familiar worlds
Grim desolation, wastelands of the seared heart
While I beckon pointlessly
At the distant, cold stars
Glum light from a billion years ago blinds me
And apathy is my response
The defense mechanism of the prideful
Place me on the rack now
Can't be much worse
The bones, the musculature
That animate my maudlin gait
Are animal responses
To animal needs
To survive, to live
Yet I am no longer that animal
No longer inclined to give or receive emotion
For, in the end, when the rigor sets in, then departs,
When worms feast on my suited flesh
When the pine box finally rots away, exposing my bleached skeleton
Emotions will be, as they always have been,
Meaningless
Author notes
I will make only one comment on this piece.
There is a series of woodcuts made, oh, about five or six hundred years ago depicting the varied punishments of people who have broken the seven cardinal sins (lust, gluttony, et cetera). The proud ("prideful" in the piece) were tortured on a wheel that stretched their backs out ("Place me on the rack now"). If I ever get my scanner to work, I might consider posting that image, as I think it's a pretty potent depiction of the feelings I had while writing this.
The rest of the poem I leave to your interpretation, as I do not wish to even think about the reason(s) I wrote it.
Thanks!
- El Gio
Written September 23rd, 2003
In a list
What did you think
Comments
-
sometimes those shadows create walls or masks to protect one's heart...
yet one prefers the silence...
numbed by the paths we have taken!
I hear you...
loud & clear!
Keep penning on!
Bill
Edited on Sep 23, 3:31 p.m. because ''. -
The mechanism of self preservation~
This altruistic, passion filled,
devotion prone idea,
fantasized and romanticized
seems more surreal than real,
Emotions meaningless??
I sure hope not~
But to hide our own pain~
At times it may seem true~
I like this poem of yours~
~~SMILES~~Emma
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