Breathing on Ashes Slope
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Written: July 19, 2025, for contest Sponsored by: Rob Carmack
Quote "The eye goes blind when it only wants to see why" by Rumi
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I stood while Genesis breathed,
a slope of cinders, forged from death.
Youth splashed sludge on my skull
kismet resonated ahead.
I ventured beyond the silk of youth—
It's homaloidal gilded ignorance
that twinkled, such coins bestowed
upon sages who sleep serenely.
Years drifted by, and you—silent,
unyielding—revealed to me
a truth that seared my sight.
Every heart,
enshrouded in perfumed decay,
bloomed hauntingly into
the grotesque.
What once appeared noble
waned
into a crass pantomime.
My soul recoiled.
Disgust surged as steam from my spine
a silent scream echoing in the sanctuary.
My spirit began to perceive—
not with eyes,
but through scars.
The past stood trial,
In the dunes of memory:
red sand, marked with conviction
I had carved it.
unaware.
Now the only way back
resounds such a distant sonata:
God calling,
igniting a raw fire
upon the canvas of my marrow.
It will never be free.
Redemption,
such as art,
always costs everything.
Each season claimed something:
a name,
a promise,
a breath.
I rose once more.
each time leaning deeper
on the wood and nails
of the betrayal.
The books of Heaven
are laden with mystery.
I grasp betwixt lines—
three measures of leaven,
hidden in the folds
of endurance.
And belief—
neither feeling,
nor certainty—
begins to underpin
the slow unraveling of sorrow.
I am not finished.
The struggle
It's never around victory—
but through
clinging fiercely
to the Word
when the world
let's pass.
Copyright © Sotto Poet | Year Posted 2025
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