Listen to poem:
King of Terrors - Buried Syllables
Written: September 7, 2026, for a contest sponsored by Rob Carmack
************
Before the cenotaph was raised in stone,
Pharaoh enshrouded kings in linen white.
Beneath an augural sky their names were known,
two brothers basked within the garden’s light.
No veiled codex, no disguise could last;
thanatopsis crumbled into dust —
and Abel fell as Cain’s clenched crux struck fast.
A raw jolt taught us what the silence hides;
the specter’s stroke inscribed its shadowed script.
A laconic lexicon lay in the chest,
its buried syllables refused the light.
Thus we have built against the yawning brink;
pyramids arose to mock the fleeting blink,
to bind eternity within the sphinx.
The chasms burned with cataracts of flame,
beneath a brittle sheen of citrine stone.
Kingdoms arose in strength, then fell in hush—
Assyria, Persia, Greece, and Rome laid low.
Marble with blood inscribed dominion’s law;
Nero beheld as latticed embers spread,
yet fire was heedless, as the grave remains.
No ordinance constrains the dark’s domain;
Pharaoh is dust, and Caesar but a name.
We felt the Nile’s imperious, languid flow;
its arcs of thirst inscribed the torrent’s course.
Sanctuaries swelled within the silent rifts—
and obelisks of stone observed our breath.
Fledgling demons shrieked upon the lintels,
rehearsing wings to mimic seraphs’ flight.
The sage replied: while we exist, death sleeps;
when death arrives, we are no longer here.
And still we tremble, crowning Death as king,
kneeling before a throne our hands have built.
Yet terror is not death, but death’s own shade.
Thanatos is no sibyl’s strife of night,
but sacred arch where shade and brilliance meet.
Twin shores are bound within one torrent’s flight,
a waxen fulcrum balancing fact and will—
Yet deeper than our fear, regret abides;
for Time devours us slowly, hour by hour.
Childhood dissolves to memory, faces fade;
the house becomes kenopsia, walls bereft.
The body wears its quiet craquelure—
for all we love already bears in silence
the first thin patina of departure’s hand.
Galaxies sway upon a single seam;
seraphic hands unite both dusk and dawn.
A coruscation hardens into law—
an iron covenant inscribed in stars.
I stumbled on a synapse in the tomb,
a desert blaze igniting noon within.
Yet compassion shined in a dimly lit room.
Reality of death shapes the context of our lives.
The rose is exquisite because it fades;
the sea is cherished for its restlessness.
A choral blaze of voices, bright with song,
shattered the creed of molten limestone walls.
Solemn mirth swelled and sanctified the air—
a scrawl of soul inscribed its fervent hymn.
Our spirits rose in revolt—not through gold,
but through the word alone, through worship’s fire,
that makes the dead speak from their dust again.
Cain slew his brother, yet the name endures;
a mother turns to music in her child,
a lover lingers in a line of verse—
The vanished speak their testament from dust.
Swoon or shiver—the choice is fertile still,
a locust cloud of legacies takes flight.
You taught us dread of desire’s burning flame,
to chase chimeric visions in the night —
The gypsy flames pirouette beneath the moon,
our swollen steps engraved in desert sand,
as fossils of our fever and our faith.
The final heresy declares: Death fails.
We rule this shadow, we who love and lose,
who know caducity yet plant anew.
Let Death retain his crown, his empty throne;
I will not waste my years to prove I live.
I will not kneel before an end unknown.
Each scythe upon the threshing floor divides;
it parts the wheat from tares, leaves bones in sand.
The awe of thorns, each prickle’s sharpened sting,
a mentor teaching hubris how to fade.
I spend this mortal breath without the fear
that life must cease, but with a sealed vow:
when death arrives, it finds a life well-lived.
And so the word outlives both stone and crown;
a breath, a name, a verse defies the grave.
Not empire’s ash, but syllables remain—
the smallest sound becomes eternity.
In language lives the pulse we cannot lose;
in every line, the vanished speak again.
Post Comments
Poetrysoup is an environment of encouragement and growth so only provide specific positive comments that indicate what you appreciate about the poem. Negative comments will result your account being banned.
Please
Login
to post a comment