I have been smothered
in a stultifying mud of lonesome indifference,
a volcanic eruption of apathetic terror casting a heavy shadow
into the corners of what is an essentially boisterous and magnificent spirit.
I should write the poems each night,
I should play my songs on the keyboard and sing the lyrics each day,
to honor the extraordinary, creative being that inhabits my shoes.
I should groove each day like the wild children of the forest to the synthesizers that burst forth in my dreams like a Black Celebration, like Your Silence Face.
Yet I go for weeks gathering dust on the instrument of Me,
expiration date 21st Century.
And I am lost in this Ferris Wheel of Mirrors,
a conversationalist talking only to himself.
I am a prism split into wavelengths,
a rainbow’s autopsy,
that motley cadaver,
staring up at the frozen thoughts of a thousand recycled moments,
and a dozen heart-shattering goodbyes.
For when no one hears the orchestra of your heart Crescendo
there is a natural tendency to stumble in your stride,
as if the harness of the empty room is holding you back from being your Pure Self.
For decades I lived for the Others,
pouring my absolute devotion into those whom had not the complexity or selflessness or introspection to truly appreciate the momentous magic bubbling up from my heart’s intoxicating elixir.
Oh,
how the mirages
swept me up!
How I believed!
How I loved so fiercely,
until the moment they retreated into pettiness,
the shackles of their own existence binding them
to a prison of their own making.
And all the towering kingdoms
crumbled into nothingness.
Oceans of love
revealed as spiritless,
whimpering,
pathetically lacking in resolve,
water denatured into bumbling hydrogen
and whimpering oxygen.
Thus,
a chorus of corpses,
those cackling crows of remembrance,
line the rain-soaked byways of the past
like road-side fatalities,
and the loveliness of blooming itself
seems to take on another meaning.
Yet tonight I write,
propelled by the firelight of a gauntlet
of flickering candles,
by the powerful beating of an artist’s unquenchable heart.
I know you must be out there,
wondering where I am.
And I love you for thinking that.
And perhaps two sentient and artistic beings
can dream such absurdities into existence.
Making love every day,
mind and body.
Sharing every peculiar corner of our minds,
dancing like fools and knowing it is the unbreakable connection
of our synchronized essences that contains meaning beyond the shallow material shadows that flicker upon the cave wall.
It is late,
and I am singing my songs.
I am no longer a young man,
but every day I am striving to be something more.
Each moment without you
does seem like a loss,
and how mistaken I have been,
but you still haven’t told me your name,
my love.
Spell it out with your lips,
here underneath the starry sky,
and may each letter last a lifetime,
and may each time we hold hands
release a flock of butterflies
in that exalted dimension of Love
where only artists can go,
where only the passionate reside,
where You and I shall soon meet,
in the scintillating waterfall
of eternal understanding,
fiery desire,
and infinite devotion.
