Tuesday, December 2, 2008

The voice of a poet

The voice of a poet soft and dulcet in its tone
or harsh, abrasive, cutting, and reaching to the core,
moves freely like the wind, touching, circulating,
and speaking only, and always, to those who wish to hear.

Ideology, philosophy, wishful thinking, memories,
unsubstantiated dreams, hopes, wishes, and desires,
woven like a tapestry too soon to be outdated
and discarded like a heap of old and musty books.

In a fire of these times volumes and manuscripts
will burn and be forgotten like bodies of the dead
and cynics will grow to outnumber those who know
till all and everything disappears into the air.

How pointless, how degrading, how useless is intent
to expose to the already wise the wisdom of the old
or shine like a star in the path of a blind man
in the knowledge that he has no eyes to see.

And the lilies in the valley, sunsets, mountains, hills,
all viewed and assessed from standpoints of the known
recede into the background as if they don't exist
like love that's annihilated on human battlegrounds.

Too numerous the setbacks and too far away the moon
to highlight a soul within the shell of flesh
and the voice of a poet disappears into the dust
to be trodden on and crushed by life's intolerance.

The air once thin, sustaining, grows thick and thicker now
with the absorption of ... simply all and everything!

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