Avenues

Passage's of will strolled in the mind,

carpeted with surreal stones of suppressed desires

paved by fantasia's hands,

glowing with hues of regret's pigment thoughts.

Darkness hides the furnace guiding through the eyes

where death fears manifested

as a used car salesman dressed as an evangelists

visiting one's nightmares.

Strident steps of resilient rage imbue the strides

feet obey automaton intuition

stumbling through avenues filled with nods

from power's puppeteers

dangling their strings as haunted harbingers

of conformity's fate.

Always looking for detours to Oz,

hearing Dorothy's siren voice

calling from some alley

where reverie's homeless offspring

sleep in memory's dumpsters.

Clinging to faded map

written by scribe from youth

who painted the sky with rainbows

and spoke of staircases to the stars.

Each step taken can't be retraced

because the second's footprints have vanished,

holding on to images sculpted in the mirror,

praying recollections of lines missing on direction's scroll

can be filled in with enough force of effort

hoping the journey will bring one to a sanctuary of light

instead of a cemetery for one's dying ambitions.