Fathomless loss, oh young maiden of the Sun,
Covers your once auburn complexion.
Bone white yet, a glowing reflection
Stirs amid the teary lake that has finally won.
O’ Helen, Ophelia; Athena’s Wisdom falters
At these diverging paths reached. Hold
Out your hands and drink the question
Untold. It’ll serve the bold for no gold.
A soulful debt sold neither to kings nor altars.
You’ll set off towards uncharted waters
’til the olive branches become your halters.
To find us both here at the same end.
The ladder’s rungs give way and bend.
Can you even see? Perhaps the wanderlust lingers
Within your eyes like a sickness. Stay and defend;
Orders taken to the heart but in your hands splinters
Fester. Where could we ever find escape? Please, lend
Me a glance of empathy in all this. Coldest of all Winters.
Visibility close to zero. Blasts of cold nip my fingers
Raw and frozen. Chained by icy hearts and integers.
Two friends grasping at a primordial fire
In an attempt to better mankind. To tend
And to witness unless we give into our ire.
UNDERSTAND
When this fateful storm finds its solemn end
We’ll drift away to somewhere we can mend.
I reach up into a spruce tree. A conifer branch‘s needles scratch at my hand. I carefully break off the end of a branch. The strong smell it secretes tinges the air. Using a blade of grass I tie the end and place the bundle on a flat rock. I look at the burning Sun then focus on the bundle. Thoughts of warmth and greed pollute my empty mind.
From the immaterial a form emerges. A burning sensation spreads through the individual cells in my arm. I wince from the pain. My cells start feeling as if the moisture starts boiling. I gasp for air. The feeling calms down a little and I begin focusing on the bundle again. The spruce needles move back and forth as if by the wind.
A spark sets the bundle ablaze. The smell of spruce fills the air even heavier now. I clear my throat and begin chanting a few words:
“The way is lost. We pay the cost of nature’s host for a toast. By the very circles and forlorn passages we come bearing the words of men. Must we be lost or can be found? The way remains lost. We ask the ghost of the forest to guide us. Hear us.”
A form materializes from the smoke. It beckons to me like a beautiful woman. My legs move without my consent and the smoke touches my cheek. I loosen my muscles up, the thick air shimmers around me, Daefyr watches from a few yards away, and daylight cascades through the treetops. The spirit dances for a few minutes.
“I hear thee. The lost. Seekers of the West caught between elven sorrow and human wrath. Will you cure the wound or infect it? The blood in you tastes sweet yet sour like berries. To prove yourself as not poison walk through these forlorn passages. Where brambles doth recede for soft feet to tread.” her mystic words choke the air and burn in my chest.
The light; concrete or abstract
Somehow we find ways to subtract,
Extract the heart beating inside.
Held down by a chosen destiny like the path had been set long ago.
And now when I’m looking in the eyes
Of others there’s a pestilence growing inside.
I’m just asking where does the heart reside
Now? Cast the die and take a ride
Through the bountiful gardens of decadents.
The day when it rains I wonder if it’s like a cadence or is it like an emptiness.
Are we living inside a trance?
Move by move we dance
Along to the melancholy tune.
I’m asking for a different kind of light coming from inside.
I ain’t looking for an ecclesiastical view, much less an optimistic one, just something to tell me that you feel. It feels like I’m surrounded by hollow men.
Abominations without a heart
But plenty of matches to start
A fire upon the fields of Eden.
What is this that we’ re feeding?
Ego, self pride, self-worth; neuroses plaguing the conscience and warping the outlook on life. Like a fish we took the hook for a little bait. So tell me where is the light now?
Did we snuff it out?
With a puff the candle went out.
The thing is withholding the truth never works out. I rush through the open fields toward the village. Some commotion on the outskirts grabs my attention like a man at his wits end grasping at straws. As I walk closer their shouts become much clearer. A group of men with spears and bows surround something. Is it a person? Is it an animal? Why do they need so many people?
Suddenly a black dog tackles one of the men down. It bites the spear in half, gnashing at the poor man’s throat, black tendrils hold back the others, and my throat dries up. I force myself to swallow. I cautiously inch my way toward the attacking beast. It’s ears perk up and it begins snarling at me. The others look at me as if to yell at me to run as far as I can.
We share eye contact for a few seconds. Neither me or the beast show any sign of backing down or otherwise weakness. I move a step closer. It holds its ground. This dance of superiority continues for far too long. Sweat drips down my neck, the beast smells my fear, our muscles tighten by instinct, it lunges for me, and I grab for its stomach. We roll on the dirt and fight for our dear lives.
Adrenaline pumps throughout my body fueling me to keep going. The dog’s strength overshadows that of any other I have ever seen. I realize I’m fighting a losing battle. Kicking the beast back I gain a little distance and more importantly time. Tendrils keep the others in a daze leaving me completely alone in this fight.
By sheer luck claw marks made a hole in my pocket big enough for the book to fall out. I grab it and feel the familiar warmness grow ever hotter. My hands burn as I feel something flow through me, my blood. The body’s struggle to regulate temperature, to supply nourishment to the organs, and to allow life. I think of the summer time where, after a long day’s work, one seeks refuge beneath the shade of tall tree.
Flames erupt from my hands. The black dog jumps back and whimpers like a small puppy. Memories of other dogs in the village return to me. I stumble and look the dog in the eyes. I lose my concentration ending the incantation. We stare at each other once again. This time we share mutual respect of each other.
The beautiful tree high above the ground
Stands there majestic. A light sound
Orchestrated by the wind and branches
Sounds like a horn blown from the heavens.
The harbinger of eternity comes to bear witness
A purge of both the innocent and guilty, a catharsis.
Dark seeds fall from the tree. They merge with the living,
Changing them from within, cutting off their connection.
Imprisoned within their bodies they must bear witness too.
Blood and tears flood the streets. The sun refuses to shine
Upon this massacre leaving them in perpetual darkness.
Sacrifices to raise a beast born from our own hearts;
One of the wretched. A serpent, the leviathan,
Reborn from malice. In the starkness
Of goodwill and kindness is where this starts.
The hardest bark and thinnest blade of grass;
Reality and dreams – caught on the shoals
Of a sea where the known and unknown
Wage war. A pendulum swinging back and fro.
Caught in the tides to which we never let go
And we become slaves to. We who own
The world actually own nothing. Fools,
Proving themselves with wealth and brass.
A darkness grows from this discrepancy.
These deeds corrupt the primal forces
Born ages before humanity. Destruction.
Is this a law of motion or simply karma?
The Dragacian people were not ready.
Fanatical beasts pour out at a steady,
Unnerving rate. Again, they were not ready.
Hatred it seeps into our hearts filling it black,
The day comes when the dawn will no longer break,
we forget who we are and who they are. A war begins.
We could walk away. Why don’t we? We could.
The differences between us never justify.
To take is to steal for we weren’t given this earth.
Question what you were told. They lied.
The world allows us to be here.
If we betray the kindness how can we say it’s unfair?
Let’s walk away. The march forward we can’t share.
A shaking fear, a trembling heart; the tides
Grow more fierce and head further inland.
I sit here awaiting it. Sifting grains of sand.
Looking for just another way that life guides.
Forward. An unsure destination
Marked by footsteps now fading. . .
Backward. A race to the beginning
Until the day forward is backward.
Do we walk and lose the path?
Do we walk until the path is lost?
Ever wonder about the nature
Of ethics? Changing with a feature
Called society and without departure.
Well, a isle in an ocean made of memories
Dared to see a new dawn of all the reveries
From which life gains purpose for stories.
A Dionysian Kingdom chasing freedom and highs.
At first the denizens talked, expressed, and loved
Without barriers but, jealousy and greed seeped in.
It does everywhere. We often fail to see this truth.
Bliss. Do we hide from the obscene or face it headlong?
Truthfully, I hope you never see all these haunting horrors
And can be free from these curses. To know human errors
Is to know your own / Maybe the pain makes us strong.
They say disregard those that are weird and to accept those that are different. When their charade is exposed the journey begins. We’re sailing into a jungle where a bright Sun burns anyone outside. Most will steer away from this land of tribulation and seek refuge in the shade, but I can’t anymore. The Sun burns away the veil. . .
Vasha'Lakar 
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