A cycle of longing, division, and the unlived life.
A man is split,
yea, split within himself.
One hand doth build,
one hand doth burn.
One tongue doth pray,
one tongue doth thirst.
One eye seeks God,
one eye seeks gold.
And still thou seekest,
yea, still thou seekest.
O man,
thou art thy own battlefield.
Thou art the horse,
and the rider.
Thou art the flame,
and the ash.
Thou art the hunger,
and the fast.
And still thou seekest,
yea, still thou seekest.
This collection was not written for or about any person.
Who
There is a woman
I have never met
who lives in me.
I have loved her
in a hundred different bodies.
I learned to want her
before I knew
what wanting was.
If I ever loved her
or if
I only wanted
to dissolve
into something
that did not carry
my weight
Many Faces
I carried her
for years
without naming her
in the women I noticed,
in the stories I remembered.
I have seen her
many times
in different eyes,
in different lives.
Why I follow,
I do not know.
Root
Somewhere early
something stayed:
a softness
I have never escaped.
Not because I must.
Not because I chose.
Somewhere
beneath the rose.
Ruin
I would give you my soul,
but it’s not whole.
And you
too warm
for something cold.
Love you in ways
that ruins rest.
I’d give you me,
but “me” is war.
You want a home.
I am nowhere to stay.
This collection was not written for or about any person.
Again he saith,
One woman, one hearth,
One name to end the wandering.
Yet by dawn,
The road hath found his feet.
Again, again,
yea, again.
One day he crieth,
Let me be held.
The next,
Let me be free.
Thus the heart churns
Like a wheel in rain,
Again, again,
yea, again.
Leaves the feast,
Calling it poison.
Returns to it,
Calling it life.
Curses the chain,
Then polishes it.
Seeks the rose,
Then kisses the thorn.
Again, again,
yea, again.
One rose, one soul,
One sacred rest.
Names thyself free,
Yet serves chains.
He searches
Not for things,
But for the end of searching.
In women, in world,
in himself.
He has not yet learned
how to hear
what does not call.
The hope in our journey
is no longer vivid.
Darkness spread far and wide
over the pathways of life.
You were my only brace
through the heavy sighs
of sorrowful nights.
No more in the garden of my heart
will the morning smile.
Night upon night follows,
one after the other.
It’s an old habit of lovers,
to spend their whole life
trapped in their memories, silently.
I set out on this journey with you
in the hope you would be beside me
every step of the way.
Who could anticipate
such a parting?
The hands that no longer touch,
and the shattered dream,
has now disappeared.
O heart of stone,
What hast thou won?
No wound may enter thee
But neither
the dawn.
A hardened heart
does not break.
It simply ceaseth
to open.
Calls this strength,
and survives itself.
Some hearts grow stone.
Too many winters.
Too many hands.
When morning comes they turn away;
there are gardens the dawn shall never bless.
What does a man have?
If he has no pride,
what does a man have?
If he has no courage,
what does a man have?
If he trembles before fear,
what does a man have?
If he has never loved,
what does a man have?
If he has never been wounded,
what does a man have?
If his life is empty,
what does a man have
but a life full of sorrow?
A man has nothing
but the quiet misery
of an unlived life.