lullaby for a lost soul
Post on 08-Mar-2016
225 Views
Preview:
DESCRIPTION
TRANSCRIPT
lullaby for a lost soul
francis booth
© 2011 by francis booth
Contents
lullaby for a lost soul ...................................... 9
empty tomb ................................................. 11
meniscus ....................................................... 12
the storyteller’s assistant ............................. 13
asleep at the switch.................................... 17
alone in the zoo ........................................... 20
chain of souls ................................................ 22
in plato’s cave ............................................. 24
passacaglia .................................................. 25
voices ............................................................ 30
thief ................................................................ 31
skeleton ......................................................... 32
bloodwords................................................... 33
flesh ................................................................ 34
dreadful night .............................................. 35
the absent teacher ..................................... 37
offering .......................................................... 38
towers of silence .......................................... 40
evolving ......................................................... 43
forests of meaning....................................... 45
the lost waltz ................................................. 46
nightstorm lament ....................................... 47
tunnel ............................................................. 48
karma ............................................................ 49
nunc in horror mortis ................................... 50
stigmata ........................................................ 52
frosted spiderweb ....................................... 53
river of no return .......................................... 54
scarecrow songs .......................................... 56
sunyata .......................................................... 58
gone beyond ............................................... 59
iron in the ice ................................................ 61
the final favour ............................................. 62
midnight masses .......................................... 65
still ................................................................... 72
carapace ..................................................... 73
fall ................................................................... 74
the language of the dead ........................ 75
abney park ................................................... 77
bardo ............................................................. 79
nosferatu ....................................................... 80
map ............................................................... 84
exit .................................................................. 85
wrath .............................................................. 86
nostalgia ....................................................... 87
siva ................................................................. 88
winter ............................................................. 89
feastrites ........................................................ 90
the rhythm of the river ................................ 93
eternal light................................................... 94
failure ............................................................. 96
autumn leaves ............................................. 97
safety ............................................................. 98
the party's over ............................................ 99
lullaby for a lost soul
lullaby for a lost soul
a life left behind
abandoned in sand
shipwrecked on shore
washed up by the waves
harbour lights on a starless night
the empty sky
the endless lies
storm-haven safety net
the morning’s catch
riding the rising tide
languidly lapping the sea wall
all the time in the world
empty tomb
poppy memories
seething with ancient sorrow
fields of the fallen
meniscus
blooddread
blackred mere
molten meniscus
viscous with
the still warmth
of lost life
the storyteller’s assistant
the storyteller’s assistant
silent witness
helpless helper
in the wings
tearing tickets and passing props
trapped in the terrarium
under a fading sun
bounded
by the narrowness of the narrative
never knowing where the arrow will fall
as the story twists and turns
like a rat in a dead end maze
as the unsaid threads unwind
waiting and hoping
for the happy ending
for the fat lady just to sing
one more time
powerless
over the fate of the protagonists
never able to reward
good with good
or evil with evil
not to requite love
nor revenge pain
delay death to the living
or restore breath to the dead
or deny the dark designs of destiny
to vanquish the victors
or give victory to the vanquished
eternal observer
actor acted upon
but never asked to act
asleep at the switch
asleep at the switch
passed out on the parade ground
lifebloodlines coursing
through chiselcarved channels
in the charnelroom cobblestones
chased through conduits
cascading through canals
gullies gouged in the guttering
tunnels troughed
veined
drained
siphoned
sluicing through sewer straits
surging in streams
red cells
running in rivulets
rushing in rills
trajected direct
through tidal tributaries
flowing free
to open sea
alone in the zoo
alone in the zoo
trapped in a cage of darkness
steel bars of fear
pressing in on perspiring skin
eargouging sounds
of crushing claustrophobia
ripping apart the air
as you search blindly for the key
scrabbling and scratching in the dirt
screaming breathlessly for release
from life without parole
chain of souls
chain chain chain
chain of souls
caravanserai of lost spirits
wandering
sandblind
through dark wormholes
groping
towards a mirage of life
no more rivers to cross
in plato’s cave
staring at the stars
from the bottom of the well
shadow cave puppet
passacaglia
the passacaglia of passing time
a slow dance in a slothful trance
of cold romance and love lost
letters etched in bitter frost
of longing unfulfilled
hope killed
by broken will
the broken glass
on the window sill
cracks let in the winter chill
a ground bass flays the frozen ground
the broken consort’s canon sounds
a chaconne of shame
an austere ostinato
on snow dusted fields
the hidden tracks
of tricks and traps
concealing gaps
in the warp of life
and the weft of death
playing a sad story of invented meaning
pointing out
the pointless patterns
portrayed and displayed
relayed
to an audience dismayed
by the dismal din
of discordant chords
diminished fifths
and unfinished riffs
unresolved progressions
and slow regressions
third inversions
final versions
total immersion
in ice cold water
a frozen stream of consciousness
momentaneous being
a faint flicker of seeing
a glimmer of hope in a splinter of doubt
unkind words in minor thirds
a masqued ball in a mirrored hall
a lonely dance
the one remaining chance
voices
voices rising up
from beneath the frozen ground
but no one listens
thief
time the great stealer
breaks in through the cellar door
stumbles up the stairs
silently in the darkness
leaving nothing of value
skeleton
steel framed skeleton
rotting, rusting, empty shell
uninhabited
bloodwords
bloodwords
gouged out of
starflamed
nightsky
glittering like
flamewreathed
crystalline daggers
blazing with angelfire
flesh
the flesh rots so fast
the soul gets trapped forever
deep in the crawlspace
dreadful night
all hope overcome
reason defeated
fear injected
directed
through pulsing veins
throbbing arteries
heartthud
tabla tapping
taiko thunder
silently in the
tombdark
welldeep
gravequiet
dreadful night
the absent teacher
inch squares of gold leaf
on the hollow bronze image
the absent teacher
offering
dusky damask red
offering flower
spurned
crushed
fragments dry as
bloodred
bonedust
pressed in the cracks
of
chalkpale
snowcold
deathfrozen
lips
towers of silence
fold on fold
furled and unfurled
a palimpsest of penitent pentimenti
a paradigm of possibilities
forging a future of fleeting fragments
molten memories in a misted mirror
spider cracks in frosted glass
the imprisoning prisms
deflecting reflections
cleaving the light
violet to red
violence and dread
the fears of the past
and the tears that don’t last
and who knows where the time goes
and who knows how the truth shows
through artifice and edifice
through the chinks and crevices
the wrecks and ruins
of remnants and remains
a raffia raft floating on dark waters
the flotsam of forgetting
on foam flecked seas
washed up by the waves
landed stranded shipwrecked
safe haven on storm sheltered shores
but soaring above
the vertiginous verticality
of seven towers of silence
evolving
firecracked
ashwhite remains
bones shattered
embers scattered
windblown dustswirls
falling and fertilising
forever
the revolving
evolving
expectant earth
forests of meaning
forests of meaning
leaves from forgotten notebooks
uninterpreted
branches of significance
dropping with overripe fruit
the lost waltz
dancing alone
in a wedding dress
midnight
moonlight
edge of the sea
nightstorm lament
nightstorm lament
sirensong in the silence
sea-fret blanket of grey fustian
muffling the meaning
suffocating the sentiment
stifling the song
tunnel
white noise, bright white light
the tunnel ends in darkness
and never turns back
karma
you pay as you go
evil done brings evil back
good returns to good
your debits accumulate
death is no escape from debt
nunc in horror mortis
nunc in horror mortis
ora pro hora nostra
whoresmile heal us
hourglass reveal us
fold back the sands
of time's straight arrow
as strait as narrow
down the final straight
with a limping gait
to the final gate
too little too late
stigmata
passion play terror
the martyr’s weeping stigmata
lachrymae sangre
blood flooding the parched tundra
searing pain of marks of cain
frosted spiderweb
frosted spiderweb
white on black december sky
moonspun miracle
river of no return
but over the cracks
of the
dustdry
bonegrey
earth of life
hangs
blacksweet
fallripe fruit
bloodbloom
hanging
on the beckoning branches
of the wishtree
on the far bank
of the swollen
swirling
river
of no return
scarecrow songs
rivers of silence
flowers of emptiness
scarecrow songs
set in lachrymal languages
seagulls
falling from an empty sky
leaving no trace
the sightless eye of the lifeless heart
sees countless
colourless dreams
dissolved into desolation
destruction
destitution
devastated and despairing
sinking
through six strata of suffering
the scarecrow’s last
sad smile
sunyata
godless temple
soulless tomb
chryselephantine athena
ruled the world
where is she now?
dharmachakra’s empty centre
gone beyond
I walk through fire
but I am not burned
I float through water
but I am not drowned
I burrow through the earth
but am not suffocated
I fly through the air
and do not fall
I live amidst the mud
but am spotless
In the midst of the smoke
I shine brightly
In the fast flowing river
I am a rock
In the clear blue sky
I am a white cloud
I live in a world of darkness and fear
but am not afraid
iron in the ice
iron in the ice
frozen hulls of rotting hulks
crushed by floating floes
fast in the translucent trap
fish swim freely underneath
the final favour
the dead hand
of disillusion and despair
descends
on your shoulder
dropping like damocles
in the darkdeep
cold arm crawling
like a bloodletting blindworm
cradling your neck
like a noose in the night
gnarled and knotted
like deviltree root
frostfingers flexing
feel your icechilled chest
and harrow your heart
stabbing like scorpion stings
intravenous injections
of potent
poisonous potions
while
inside your ear
is a doubletongued
duplicitous demon
dissembling and deceitful
as the hand hovers
at your choking throat
fulfilling the final favour
midnight masses
mooncold mouths
in translucent faces
glimmering with snailtraces
shimmershifting
drifting
through summerlost reveries
revelling in revelations
silent cerebrations
of little victories
vanquished
vanished
banished
to the cellar of sadness
of mighthavebeen madness
regret and repentment
resentment
a continent of lost content
the cracked cement
of heavenspent chances
backward glances
through memoryglass
misted
by the slime of time
slathered
with the moss
of unrelenting loss
unremitted cost
the cross to bare
your sole
hope of redemption
from sins of remission
a coward’s contrition
in the face of the force
of destiny’s child bride
on a wild ride of wide strides
through avenues
of abandoned hopes
and hangman’s ropes
nooseknotted
rotted
by timeworn terrors
erasured errors
lost in the missed
and never been kissed
on rosehip lips
sealed with a hiss
of slithering snaketongue
hatespun
faterun
firedances
bloodsacrificing lifechances
deepslicing knifeglances
lances of longing
and wronging
songs of unbelonging
to crowds of unknowing
bestowing their curses
in spiteridden verses
nighthidden
unforbidden guests
unwelcomed
blacklight visitors
firewalkers
nightstalkers
midnight masses
yearning to breathe free
still
still faintly beating
maybe somebody will come
before it gets too
carapace
red skin on dead skin
carapace of scar on scar
remembrance of pain
fall
bright coloured flowers
reach for the sun, fail, and fade
and fall, back to earth
the language of the dead
the language of the dead
ghostwritten
in blackletter
engraved
scratched
on dank sallow walls
rust
etched nail deep
into bright metal
spelling out
screamsilent cries
from the necropolis
calligraphies
undeciphered
by the still
living
abney park
scared around the sacred ground
terrified by graveyard sounds
ein jeder engel ist schrecklich
urns and angels, ancient bones.
cherubs grimace from the stones
ein jeder engel ist schrecklich
ivy covered angel wings.
silently dead voices sing
ein jeder engel ist schrecklich
bardo
skyburied bodies
exposed on the mountaintop
vultures overhead
the body reaches the sky
40 days and born again
nosferatu
chalkbone white
fingers curling
lines of alabaster dust
nacreous nails
of bitter almond
parched parchment pearls of skin
stretched over ivoroid skull bone
kohl-lined caliginous sockets
redroot veined rims
surround
pewter-pupilled eyes
blood spiked
cracked crimson lips
bared back
reveal ruby flecked canines
sharp as stiletto steel
aphotic form
ancient bones
silhouetted on silent stones
shimmering
in sunless
stygian shades
of cavernous catacombs
the silent sepulchre
epicene aesthete
twice as old as time
emaciated
exgratiated
insanguinated
satiated
surfeited
solitary
secluded
sequestered
sad
map
the edge of the map
beauty begins with terror
monsters lie in wait
exit
the nearest exit
in case of emergency
may be behind you
wrath
the world turns and turns
and always turns out badly
endless wrath of god
nostalgia
an abandoned park
the empty swing creaks softly
memory’s cool breeze
siva
destroyer of worlds
dancing on the shattered bones
deaf to the screaming
temples rise from the ashes
flowers dare to face the sun
winter
preening peacocks cry
in the silence of the night
winter is at hand
feastrites
feastrites
fleshquaking
fortunebooks foretelling
the passingbell passes by
doppler shifted
blue to red
nightfarer
nightfoundered
jaggy shocks
on ragged rocks
highviced imaginer
incarnated
birthnight brainsickness
diskindly
dishumourously
dissevered
mancipated
in momentaneous mortifications
excantated exequies
of excarnification
in noctuary obtenebration
relumined and revicted
in the pravity
of postluminous perennity
the rhythm of the river
a rhyming timeline
the rhythm of the river
running in iambics
eternal light
flameflickers
firefluttering
stammering stuttering
hammering muttering
disembered limbs play
unremembered hymns
to treebarked seas
in timescaped lees
stormsheltered arbour
in a havensafe harbour
halflights twinlking
with homeflight inklings
pillowsoft pinpoints
nocturnal bright
to eternal light
failure
souldark certainties
hanging in the empty air
failure foreshadowed
autumn leaves
spring forward fall back
autumn leaves a bitter taste
of disillusion
safety
for your own safety
everything is forbidden
or compulsory
the party's over
the clock strikes midnight
no use throwing rocks at god
the party's over
top related