Forgive me, solemn spirits, for I know nothing of your struggles.
I am one man, in a world of many mannequins,
Decorated in the finest of golden nets,
In the most superb of diamond reticula,
In cerulean opal, that seldom outshines
The lustre and allure of a billboard
That stands satisfied, proud, above the remnants
Of many men, who saw in cold rails
The grandeur of a vibrant paradise
Promised, if they were to only jump
And see for themselves what it felt like below.
Did they feel the calloused hand of God reach for theirs
In a moment of bleak despair?
Did the sound of trumpets from the summit
Inform them, that they were finally there?
And could any safety make the sound
of a crunch
Anything
but silent?
Trip.
I trip upon a step.
I was four years old, when I first felt it.
It was cold. A touch that reminded me of
Winter, gnawing at your bones,
Having assembled pines of rust
To bore into supple skin that bled
And bled
Bled out on the floor
Until iron had stained the pavement
Perhaps to dry. Perhaps to waste.
The canvas wouldn’t care, either way.
A pedestrian passes by. He tugs on his strings.
He enjoys what I have drawn
At four years old, a masterpiece
But one would never suffice.
“You have a long time, before you ever die.”
“You will need tons, each and every time.”
Be proud of yourself
For you
You have felt the loving touch of cement.
You will feel it, greater each time
And each day, a new piece will be born
When it cuts and bites at you.
Demanding more.
You have fed this rabid beast before
Why not feed it again?
Maybe this time, it will be satisfied
And this will be your greatest yet.
Until the next.
And the next.
And the very, very next.
Time wears down all artists, no matter how sharp the needle.
Strands of black will stain the red you spew.
Sediment will hang heavy in your water.
Ask only one question to yourself:
Your skin has grown strong.
Has your resolution grown stronger?
Trip.
I trip upon a step.
I was eleven years old, when I was thrown from the nest
To live a life among cuckoos
Whose sickly children had grown in place of my brothers
My sisters
And my friends
Whose umbral offspring were showered in love
That came as cascades from rooftops above
With drips of precious Heaven
In their sunlit midst.
It was never mine.
But it was never theirs, either.
We all were born in cocoons, suspended
Above an antipathetic abyss
That showed us the torment of empty hands
And taught us to keep them outstretched
In the hopes that one day,
We would feel the weight of lustrous silver
Guided by patience
By doctrine
By the fear of returning
To where it had all started
Among luscious gardens that we dug out of
With our own two hands
Hoping to see brighter skies
and walls, not of concrete
But of endless stars.
Gifted in its place
Was condemnation to a spire that rose, not into that green pasture
But into a final resting place
Fit for the remnants of a cadaver
That was desecrated and violated
by its very own brood
Until even it had no idea
Who it belonged to
Who had lost it
And what had wrenched it to the very top
Among thousands of lifeless replicas
Only to discard it.
And to this pitiful sight, I say:
May his soul rest in peace.
May his funeral be attended
by those who tasted his viscera
who enjoyed the sight of the empty spring
that sat dormant in his whitened scleras
Who sing now, voices joyous
As evanescent thunder:
“He was a good man, a pleasant bastard”
“And a failure, right in theory,
Forever lost in practice.”
Trip.
I trip upon a step.
I was twenty years old, when I ventured out
From those crowds, that dressed themselves in ether-bound bodies
From those tunnels, where barriers kept dreamers from severed heads
From those streets, that demanded I carve laughter from hollow husks
And from those pavements, where I feared I would disappoint those that loved me
Those that found solace in my words
Those who held me, when wings of wax would burn
And those that lived on the life that seeped from my veins
When I let the flames envelop the body
that I had yet to deserve.
Forgive me, solemn spirits, for I insult your very names,
Neither righteous, nor brave, nor human at all.
I decorate myself in the grey, brutalist velds,
That infest the streets
And suffocate day
Until smoke feigns power over all
Forgive me, lamentations, for I stand on the precipice
Of a glorious fall
That beckons my name
That begs for the last drop of my blood
So that it may take me
As I am
Not as I will be
But not as I was, either
For what has taken that boy’s place is miserable company
That finds pleasure in the forlorn figures
I oft see by derelict bridges
among the willows
Marching towards the water and revelling
in its restless heart
And the realization
That they are happier,
Now that they are faded silhouettes
Upon a dirt-stained ground.
Trip.
I trip upon myself.
I too have long succumbed to the confines
Of a spiral staircase that extends, far into limbo
A state of being alive
Built on clinging onto an ethereal ego
Whose bowels leach off of my work
And run into the jowls
Of tapeworms.
Tapeworms that live in apartments
In offices
In markets
In schools
In gratification
At the bottom of the world, and at the summit
Where their cadence matches that of the wind
And echoes throughout the downwards plummet
Until it stops
One day
And there is silence.
Forgive me, dear friends, for there is nothing to cheer
About a life well wasted
Spent on sunken costs
That sunk into my cheeks
And left the face of a spirit
That stares with spite at a mirror
And cleanses its eyes
At a sink
Etiolated.
Your first friend
Your enemy.
Trip.
I was here, foot brushed against the palisades,
When I realized that indeed, it was true:
Cement loved me
Cuckoos would forever win
And my drawings, however incomplete
Must reap a pleasant finish.
A perfect performance must end at a low.
And I stand too high to end the show
Yet.
Trip.
A sea of faces underneath; I have loved them all
For it was the glimmer in their eyes
That often made me sob
And realize that I could be better.
I would do well to be buried among them
A cautionary tale
Best dead, than alive
Trip.
I feel greater than everything.
I feel human, once more.
I stand on the corpses of those who constructed
Skies of grey, and feel proud that I will not join them
Nor those punchdrunk enough
To die in a painless instant.
I will wait
I will feel alive
And only then will I be satisfied.
Right foot first;
Left foot last.
Trip.
I deny the calloused hand of God.
I deny transient trumpets.
And I deny fleeting bliss,
Insincere, as it is.
There is much left to say, solemn spirits,
but every hymn must end.
I deliver my final vow to never see
the precipice
Crunch.
again.