In my Dreams

This hyena laughter rings and rounds my mind
and if I should repay it, bladed and armored and in kind,
my own laughter shall find itself owned
by one in wilderness alone.
Terrible and wonderful and all those other adjectives
do not begin to describe my own reality, objective or subjective,
universal or unversed or otherwise
for all this scale is brought down to size by the dwarfing corridors
of my mind.
And all my enemies will find themselves stored away here,
their challenges ringing between my ears, for:
"Any who threaten my home or my family will soon have a place in my dreams."

FUBAR

They are all of them FUBAR
who cross this river, not knowing that it is a Styx
or a Lethe for they have forgotten.
The briefing told them:
"Advance to the river bank,
dig in,"
but there is something cowardly and against their warrior-ethos
in digging in the dirt like dogs,
and so instead they advance on the citadel,
its black and oily war-smoke rising up like a banner
above the battle-plain.
Underfoot crunch the bones
of those long-dead warriors
who fought here long before they died,
the marrow sucked out in great slurpings and gnawings
until nothing is left but the brittle remainder
of a warrior who almost never-was,
who is FUBAR too.

Mask Yourself

Mask yourself
for maskless we are mortal
and made in an image we should not share in
and cannot shake the feeling
that our vigilance
and our valor
is the lesser when victory serves violence
and not vice-versa.

Though ye beings of pure light
may shine down on all of us
it is from the unlighted
corridors of the mind
that we strike.

The Man of Metal

There he stood, the man of metal,
encased in his armor and enshrined in his own glory
through deeds beyond the ken of mortal men.
But what of the man?
Why his thoughts and the abhorrent images that spring for his mind?
For these valorous deeds are the work of a titan
beyond any of us,
and it should be terrifying to be in his presence.

The man in armor is man no longer.
Now he is a deific expulsion of truth and justice
beyond what we can withstand.

There's no image or idol like the beams of light
he sends to illuminate the world.

Remembering Iason

Let us all remember him
who was a mighty warrior once
who strove for life at every chance
and who was brought down by treachery.
Golden-clad he seemed to me
when we placed him on the pyre
though I know it was my own sweat
and tears reflecting the wasting light.
Not hero-born but hero-blooded
and I wish I could have seen him then
held up by the dead he laid to waste
ennobled by his furious rage
and terrifying to behold.
Remember him to all your enemies
in the sound of your war-cries
and the beating of your hearts.

The Empty Throne

Troglodytes and terrors from the dark
do not haunt and howl so forcefully
as those thoughts of mine which blissfully embark
and target my sanity remorselessly
for he abandons (or Abaddons) his post, the arch-
angel who guards against them sightlessly
and underneath it all, the fall of kings
in their great halls, givers of rings
and dolls and precious things
does hole and harry my heart.

My Rood

Upon their wings they paint the roses
of all yesterday's tea-parties
and all yesterdays beheadings.
When I wake I see them still,
the ironic flowers of war,
ferric in their ferocity,
their cross to bear.
And would that the rood re-transformed
and flowered again
but it is an already-deceased tree cut down to craft the cross.
I saw them cut it yesterday.

All the Thunderous Rage

All the patients in the world could not satisfy these doctors
who poke and prod and have them lie
and steal and cheat and are instrumentalized
by their towering but collapsing intellects,
these epigones,
these eidolons,
these foul cruelties stretched over
and over and over
until taut as drum-skins they beat out the beat
and it pretends sublimity, this thunder,
but does it know it is a thunder of the mind?

Artair's Bears

There they are in full panoply of war,
all of them sons-of-bitches,
dog-men and dog-warriors,
brothers one and all.
Their claws gleam in the noon-bright sun
and their fangs gnash and grind
and their pelts are snow-blown
and wind-wrapped about themselves
for they are but beasts,
alone in the wilderness.

Let them all come, those whoresons
and vagabonds, who like their
namesake bear up the burden of the world.
They are Atlas-ed in their shame
and bow snout down to the earth
to sniffle and grumble at their fate.

Bears, how I adore thee
and wish to be armored in the certitude
of fruitless victory
that you bear so nobly.