Requiem

Oh! if I'd known the road was broken --
I would not have breathed the stars,
drowned my head in brackish oceans,
trekked over black earth so far.

God! if I'd known the track was beaten --
I would not have swam through fire,
ate the blood fruit from sweet Eden,
prophesied my funeral pyre.

Ha! if I'd known the path was undone --
I would not have danced with fervour,
engraved myself in shapes of sun,
loved you how I loved the cold air.

To Phobos

I strip away the indolent cower
For fear did not create this tower;
Upon this rock it holds no power;

Over this wild being, restraint
Is not the palette, not the paint -
It will not mar, it will not taint,

Nor will it sacrifice the art
Inside the throbbing savage heart.
But it will be a burning part
Raging against eternal dark.

So bring the metal anvil through,
And let me smash the night in two,
Sheep herd, murmur quick adieus

To foul, troubled winters bleak.
For are storms quiet, are they meek?
Is not mad winter what men seek?

Is this what evolution primed
Year after year, time after time,
That man churn out falsetto mimes,
Whilst tired with his daily grind?

I will rise up, and say this much:
That disappointment cannot touch
Those men who shape their lives in such

Boundaries and chained confines
Which assets grasp and then refine
The future hope for the divine.

But neither can he feel the sun
Of bravery radiant upon
Green fields of dreams that he has spun
That only through action is won.

Undone

Uncoil the yarn, liberate the string,

Half of Kephisos dried up in the spring.  

Undo the cord, relinquish the rope,

Cut callidity from our dearest corpse.

Unravel the wool, tend to the thread -

We strip away our unforgotten dead.  

Perception

When Alfred Stone was 9 years old
He was afraid to go bed.
The blackness that engulfed his room
Just filled him up with dread.

The darkness, he feared,
was full of things, that children should not see.
Monsters, ghouls and foul creatures,
from which he could never flee.

Then one day, in his teenage years,
Led on a dark and grassy moor,
Alfred gazed up at the stars,
And was drawn by their allure.

He replaced the stars with people,
fighting against the tide, 

To be seen to shine so brightly,

And it filled him up with pride.

Alfred wished to catch a star,

Right there upon that hill.

So he swung a rope around the moon,
- it is rumoured it’s there still.

As legend goes, on that very spot,

If a person is of true heart,

They can pluck a star out of the sky,

And that’s only just the start!

But one must be carefully how they use,

This gift of fame or glory,

For not everyone can have a perfect,

Happy ending story.

Alfred Stone was young and pure,

As you would never find him now,

So wish wisely upon that lonely hill

Or you will perhaps discover how…

A boy with so much talent,

though lost as he had seemed,

Sees nothing now but darkness,

in a dream that cannot be.

In his room he sits alone,

Curtains drawn to keep out light,

Older now and much more worn,

Too busy wanting to shine,

That he forgot to live at all.

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- Jayne