Nevermore – Ribbons and Lost Silence

a muse for a time and forever loved

by Elizabeth Drisko

Oh, how bravely did you leave us

Sailing for a foreign shore

How our hearts did break within us

At the thought of Nevermore

-Tombstone

Dream Boat

Dream Boat

Lost on the endless waves

ghost

No island No land

ghost

Sky endlessly overhead, filled

with clouds

and blue waves, blue sky

ghostly

lost at sea

No way to come in.

A woman, Waiting at shore,

Crying.

Ghost. You do not cry or

dry your sightless eyes on

the sails.

Forevermore lost

Dream Boat

Lost

letting go shards with our voice

into the night for joy.

I, too, sang,

while you cried for the

loss of us and your

childhood. “Mistake’ your

refrain, spoken broken, unsung.

Of two lovers in the darkness-

now without song.

Goodnight, my love,

the moon is high,

and my chest is full of werewolf love.

Goodnight.

On Safari

Branching into insanity

Any escape.

Decapitated sensibility

Smashing TV, then everything

Dancing the dance of balance,

and Fighting.

Me sleeping with a chair leg

in my couch,

fencing drunk blindly –

Dreaming American Dreams

Drinking Whiskey

Sprouting Seeds,

and frying them.

Dancing

Wasting

Life.

Smiling

At your tears.

Laughing.

Don’t lose your mind

(On Safari)

Hurt Cry

From your lips or mine?

I have lipstick

I put it on,

with cologne.

You don’t look at me

studied effort

you almost shake from it-

maids dusting the place.

Listening.

I want my pirate father

I want my pirate mother

I want a home.

I’m ill-bred – for this.

Even when you crawl,

I let the dust gather.

While I sit over my small happinesses

Over

It’s over before it began.

When you smile

I am lost

And blind

forever

until you stop.

Darkness, doom and gloom,

I sit surrounded by swirling

dreams.

and the light in your eyes

went out

When you looked at me.

Where Hustlers Go To Die

In your eye

I fear

the abyss.

Bottomless, endless nothing –

but You.

In your actions, in your

voice –

annihilation

Totems and Worlds fall

and I won’t know.

Standing on the edge

of your eyes’ blackness

I know nothing about

anyone.

Angel Dark

Angel dark, young, so mean

with your gentle smiles slay (me)

Undone ribbons and dreams of black silk

White ribbons.

And white soul, I shiver before

you,

I see your gentle smile

but I see your blackness.

I fear.

I play pirate chords as the

night draws down.

Black angel

With a Dove’s voice,

surrounded by the cries

of the heartbroken,

broken,

and me.

The bitter winter winds

sweep my heart.

A violin plays

(A drop of blood falls)

I am thirsty for life’s glass, to drink you

away,

I wait. In the cold.

Gloom

I covered the world in fantasy

white mist swirling with dreams.

But beneath it is life –

the forest pushing up

and spreading moss beneath

my feet.

Below you is the world

watching

Caught up in my fantasy

for you,

While I set my foot in the dirt.

Even the seas live,

heave with breath.

I ride the currents,

marry my earth.

I love you, yes,

I wear a false ring.

You fall in love with

beauty every day, lost

in the mist, sometimes

blind with love.

Sympathy

The magic sympathy

rolling Mountains forested

in the darkness black.

I sigh by a stump,

conjuring you.

In love with the colors

in daylight, still dreaming

of stars.

Fair one.

Autumn leaves fall on the

wind.

The pond sails

them, and gathers them

to it’s black depth.

And the sun rises.

Soft

Sons of wealth

soft as thistledown,

soft as eiderdown,

Ladies hard as nails.

I’ll nail you.

(So you miss me.

I miss you.)

Simple breeze, simple button-down shirt.

My Girl Eyes

Rusting signs swing on the whisper

of your breath

Sighing for something unseen but

felt surely through and through

No one thought to ask you how

day was

I watched you wind down the

line of today into yesterday,

whispering without moving

your lips.

Lonely as you.

Wind in long grass

to my shoulders

blowing like sea waves

roaring wind, unseen wildcats

Held

To hold you at last in my

arms at last. Fallen.

Below is the abyss.

Captured Prince

Without a heart

I imprint your shadow

onto my darkness.

The gloom has cracked

around your power,

Sun streaming as you rise,

serious,

and I am afraid

As you walk by,

and hide.

Will your spell entangle me?

Or will your serious eyes

waver,

what spell is this?

And your powers rise

into the fire

of your true desires,

released from you in

time

like flares of lightning.

Gypsy

A dark ribbon

by a fire

in the blackness of night

(pulled between your fingers)

Rain falling from leaves

in a distant memory

of loneliness

Winding a story with silence.

I am lost to (you)

(and) the moon

Old

Boy you stand so secure

on the side of the rock

unbuffeted by wind.

The tale isn’t over,

Outside the rain fall like

a memory of snow.

The moon climbs on the

back of the howling

wind.

The flowers die and fade

into brown,

like the fallen leaves,

old now, and sodden.

I want to taste your lips.

A flavor of mystery and

adventure.

And blood, a desire to destroy

lurks in your eyes.

Guttural

Townies in a clean town

of endless sun and purple and

red skied nights

devoid of stars.

Homeless stars, good looking

and full of charm, endlessly

rich with luck and women,

sweeping the town clean at

dawn, glorious dawn fed by

smog, bright and close

reflected on the shining teeth

of a smile, before the rich

come to breakfast and

admire the town,

in the center of which

is on fat man on a bench

who never moves

and of whom I take picture

after picture, fascinated,

as the young skateboard

by on brick walks,

and he does not watch them

with pride,

as painters arrive to drink

coffee and create, and

ignore him.

Over the village a

schizophrenic sat vigil,

haunted by dreams of a

black-hooded girl, till he hung

himself, and the man on the bench took no

notice.

At the train station, the

town’s free and young meet, and the

day’s games begin.

Flame of Hope

Die hard banded Color

grounded By a wire

YOU to watch

the fire burn

brighter than a spark from a black stone

all alone

from a falling star

*

cupped in my hands,

hope.

Undead Soul

From the glittering heights

of company green and gold

beautiful and graceful and good

I fell into blackness so

complete

I felt every soul in the world

which gave up

and was lost.

Untold, wild spirit flights.

Across the plain moon, in setting

sun dreams. Freedom is what

I want, freedom to dream

alive. Awake in the setting

sun, awake in my dreams,

awake in the day, awake in

the desert. A nomad, unalone,

a people. (Or a one)

Your

weather in a tropic

changes quickly,

but somehow your

one’s

frozen.

warm rains to cool slush.

where is the flush of summer’s heat?

I creep, beguiled by a flurry

of snow, wild wind, and on it bearing

maybe a word, or perhaps

a

frozen

silence.

a glimpse of blue sky. and gone.

trees crack, weighted with ice

and there is a frozen drizzle

behind the borders of your eyes.

Silence

I.

Silence When I’m with you

I can make no sound

I’ve forgotten how

The thunder comes and shakes me awake,

the ghost of my shame walks,

shedding a shroud of lies and false smiles in the privacy of night.

Oh, keep your dream of me,

the one where you pursue me, and I am not to be caught.

Where there is love in the countryside

II.

Silence. Beside you, I am dead.

Your memory is the only place I live.

Insults gather in streams once freshened by love.

Only you know how I died,

and was only who I am.

No one sees more.

I am alone in this place without my pride,

my tongue is stilled, and I am broken.

No one cares. I was once alive.

I am a dinosaur, a fossil, a memory.

The ending has come for my youth.

III.

Angelic waters wash unsaid memories of lost kernels of joy,

fabricated in the land of lost souls

hiding from pain in the exquisite wonders of pleasures,

hiding from lost children of doom and gloom.

Only it’s said that no one wins;

the joy is the compensation for the ruin.

No animal will come close

To the land where we discovered love and destroyed it to a memory of joy

IV.

Why are we lost here.

A memory divulged a shame.

Where are the forgotten ones -

an attack on our castle,

they were the ones who cried.

A wonder that I’m alive to see you rise.

A wonder you have no teeth to speak lies

with when your words are honey;

false in your head is me.

Aside. No play for you,

it is all in reality.

Rising sun has covered our play and no one will forget you when I am a lost one.

A lost and firefly unseen in the light.

Asunder we meet, and you stare into my empty world.

V.

Meet me long lost soldier’s friend

I am afraid for you

Tonight when the wolves prowl.

Innocence is lost, I’m afraid,

And the sky is dark red.

Undying are coming to claim you for the night.

More wonder will see you through the train ride.

You who care only for yourself.

Quiet now, silence. The curse has lifted.

Red

Red orange trees flaming, like his hair

Red lips, red-rimmed ocular

No one flies truly,

Windows clear and panes broken

No one loves you broken. But us.

Clear-eyed youth lost forever

unimaginable times lost, unmade

future comes forward, again, again

youth grown again, lost youth again

Are you going to cry for the lost?

noon comes and goes, and trees fade.

houses fall down beneath the leaves of the book of life.

pages torn from me,

ocular density

dense vision dances away

Land pales and dries.

Simply dries.

tapestries forgotten, faded, gone.

grizzled dreams

fall untended to fire

eyes rimmed from fire drink

The End.

Star

I.

Morons speak better than I on love.

II.

Why are you waiting for me, boy?

Cars line the road to foreign places.

Cry for lost signs of your passion,

farm boy who won’t care but who waits.

Angel faced winner of dilated eyes

and dreams of beauty born of madness,

dreams of conquered beauty.

Wonder what to say to love

when

All boys but you talk.

Waves of joy caught on my hooks.

III.

Indian passions burn in your soul of fervor,

depths of consequences in every work spoken.

Fair eyes, black and lustrous.

Indeed he is finer than hungered life,

fine and mean of relinquished heart.

IV.

A boy still, a man’s mind,

I forget to be careful.

Magic comes with flags of prayer

to you on hurricanes of desire.

No answer, you stand in the eye,

the middle of your life

unmoving, but in soul world.

Untouched by life’s fever.

You have given up the world for madness

of sights unseen

to us, to me, alone, trapped.

Looking for a symbol of madness’ beauty flowered.

V.

Holy boy, unbidden.

How they gather,

and you ignore,

and sometimes they pray to you, too,

with joy.

As you inspire.

Asunder from them,

you float alone.

Wonder and terror in your world flee

color from eyes now black holes.

To be you is no answer to

love, and they fall without

hope for solid arms, the

fall is without end,

and all color is gone from

hope, to be of your world.

Again I cry at beauty like an eagle,

as you lose them to yourself

without end,

I feel akin,

and on you fly, a witch

to beauty, dangerous in your

fair incarnate.

Destruction without a glancing.

And without end you fly through time.

Without hunger a storm, and you

are quiet.

Till the end.

Angel

By moon bright silver

I conjure

and in daylight’s shadow

I conjure

And revealed by sun

Conjure forward paper tribute

to you, unheard.

Beneath moon silver and mists

of fear I talk to you, unheard,

who talk back, once lost

and forever. now an echo. Your demon.

I am blind. Black shadows

walk in the world of spirits,

and I conjure. In.

In the shadow of day.

From afar you stir – I am

blind. Hidden. Unheard, now an

echo, a spirit. You stir a

smile.

The Blazing sun catches me in

curiosity, and clothed in

the sun, standing on the

moon, blind, animal, I conjure.

The joy. Of soul’s reunion.

Dark world loved by day, we are

a people of magic.

Master

Light, a rise in dreams

before darkness falls

the stage.

Ravine words-

inner child’s tomb

is unsaid words

don’t fall now, ledge

is clearly low enough –

now begin…

My violent men

leave me unsaid mob

dreams, don’t color their sleep

black and stark white

corners to turn.

Princess of past dream.

Oh lovely young love –

you turn away,

and again I cry, “Boss.”

To you I cry songs

you aren’t listening to her.

Only sing of light before night’s

fallen,

come to your world and cry

goodbye to light,

when dreams fell to black and

stark white,

uniforms of white, black

memory, gone was you,

not she of color, you

love it in secret, the

animal who will escape

to dream in color, and

black and stark white,

cold and warm,

towards her, to see a path

beyond a song of your

own, beyond the past

of color of love, beyond

the present of black and

stark white, beyond a

picture of all experience,

you will come to an

unknown place.

Explored in all your

dreams, and known

to your heart.

Leaden foot lift and walk on.

Forward or back, the

dreamscape’s the same,

color and black, you

will escape home, to

the unknown, the

familiar ground you’ve

walked without feet.

I cry on, restless, don’t

tell me anything. I

am mastered, but I

dream alone. You will

be free to sing and speak

unto death.

Uncaught to

Silence,

and untold

morality of uncreation.

I will tell you a story

of eternity, wild freedom.

A Word

You say, suffer.

Above us hangs a cloud.

A white one with a little

black inside.

A sudden torrent

You whisper hoarsely on high

And are redeemed.

Ruin

ruin of endless eye

over fields mist covered and ghost

haunted

another dark shadow uncovered

by the moon, me left

unthought ruin, abandoned

love, crumbled and ancient

and wrong.

site of broken druid marriage

circle, piles of stone

overgrown.

not you seen, but something older,

jagged lit ancient priest of

darkness presiding over, and hidden,

what was good, arms

raised, and the blackness

of storm covers the moon.

darkness has fallen.

arches. dry. wet. with

ending comes unexpected

desires. hidden.

songs escape the chasms.

you write of love over this ravine.

Lost Silence

I dream of ribbons when I dream

of his anger.

They slide

through my fingers as he stands

behind me, full of silence and secrets I

do not know. I have nothing

now but ribbons, and the

fleeting companions of time

who surprise me with love.

Penniless penitent, I am rich only in

ribbons, and in a smile that is

sometimes hard to lift.

The sun has set, and it is dark now.

I lay, the feet of a crying boy in

my lap. We both shake with

his silent cries.

Outside, behind the clouds which

fly like ragged witches, the moon is red.

I passed you today, and you

looked away.

The boy cries, another

stands on his head nearby, then sounds

a singing bowl. Reads a Buddhist poem of peace.

I thought I’d like to torment you

to passion, which surely exists

in such a darkness as this.

But I won’t. I’ll pass by, a

ghost of a voice, a song trembling

on my lips of the beauty in

the sadness of night. Smile at a memory.

Of. Your eyes.

They held – ‘all beauty and all illusion1”

- and unknowable thought –

(how silent we often are).

Gaze into your eyes, I am

lost in seconds of perfect

bliss

so rare in this life,

and quickly gone.

The sounds of life returned.

Last night I ran barefoot through the

we grass to a circle of

trees with a laughing girl

who hugged them all, the

magic in the tree circle is

always found, night after night,

and the lonely fear when I’ve gone

alone.

Still his tears fall, and the rain

and wind have fallen silent to

listen to the beautiful music which

winds us in the warm of togetherness,

on five winding lines.

Perhaps if I had long hair I’d

cry into it for you, but I

don’t. I’d cry for love, my

love has never stopped for

anyone. But passion passes.

Perhaps, I think,

and the boy cries harder,

and the other looks noble

in his stillness, and as I write,

I’ll stop thinking now.

Of what you may have though, and walk on.

Once, you were the fisherman.

I was the fish, one of many,

caught in your net. I

with golden scales, gasping

for breath in the bottom of

your ship. I offered three wishes.

And I died ungranted.

And walk on.

Pull, face on a sardonic smile,

eyes gleaming. A little rhythm.

Suddenly close, I breathe

faster. So chest rises,

and smells of sweat

and quick gleam of

teeth.

1. Beautiful and Damned Fitzgerald