Gather your false prophets

and sycophants

 Bury your heads

in the deepest sand

 

Tell the same lies

 as you sing to the choir

 Slave to the mirror

—and sleight of hand

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

He had more past

than future

his rope was

getting thin

The choices made

the debts he paid

lost time

the biggest sin

 

His memory out

for barter

to change that

yet to come

For one last chance

to do the dance

whose music

—zero sum

 

(The New Room: May, 2023)

In search of my shadow

in the torrent of kings

I wade through the current

of all other things

 

Alone treading water

my essence bemired   

This river a dungeon

of banished desire

 

I reach out to grab it

it motions away

To outline my image

while swirling at bay

 

And not till I’m sinking

does it buoy my form

To chase was my folly

—now rescued reborn

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

Too big to absorb

Montana at hand

Its distance won’t focus

Montana at hand

Two eyes not enough

Montana at hand

Forever illusive

—Montana at hand

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

What have we but life

both first and last

The rest an illusion

—of future’s past

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

 

If time is a prior assumption

—all else falls into line

 

(Villanova University: May, 2023)

Trapped in between the lyric

and music

Wandering in a rhythm

of lost expectation

Blaming each note still unplayed

and unwritten

The echoes distend

in a moment’s undoing

 

Hearing a chorus

when no choir is present

Voices imagined

to sing my sequester

Wandering aimless

through scores of abandon

Harmony denied me

—nightmarish and deafening

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

When given the moon

don’t ask for the stars

Light when reflected

—from Heaven afar

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

The birthmark of Satan

a spherical star

Old curse in the distance

new devils at war 

 

His prophecy stolen

the markings of Cain

Madonna the virgin

rebirth unattained

 

Melody of darkness

blasphemies hymn

The garden left burning

original sin

 

Tomorrow in mourning

this moment on fire

The lamb off the altar

—redemption expired

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)

Yesterday’s future

tomorrow today

subsuming transcendence

in all that we say

 

Perpetually present

the time to recall

all life in this moment

whose instant befalls

 

Begin a new ending

to whirl in the wind

the clock a reminder

its hour hand spins

 

Memory’s treasure

the fuel to inspire

each log a new effigy

—raised from the fire

 

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)