I crossed the archives as one walks through a field of ruins.
Decrees were bones, dogmas were nails.
Kings signed treaties in ink darker than darkness, a pact forged in daggers.
Papal bulls oozed blood beneath God's varnish.
Codes etched the systematic animalization into stone.
They legislated hell, administered suffering, theorized the slaughterhouse.
Even science became an executioner,
draping contempt in formulas and measured skulls.
I didn’t read history,
I breathed it,
its ashes glued to my lungs,
its screams wedged in the margins.
They crucified continents for their gems,
their plantations, their ores, and their silences.
They told me: progress.
But I saw boots pressed to throats.
They told me: forget.
But the graves still speak.
They told me: democracy.
I saw tanks circling the ballot boxes.
And you, West, with your carnivorous grin,
you demand forgiveness without returning the bones.
You scream values with your pockets full of plunder.
You dress up your hunger as mission.
You baptize your rape as liberation.
You persist, you insist, you gorge yourself.
But our memories are neither dead nor tame.
They sharpen.
I just want to bless
All that's around me with no stress
Even those within me, with love and ease
For peace and prosperity I have made decrees
A life is pretty stale, somewhat sad, so static
Striving seems to mock it, and 'bout it, ecstatic
He's at the drop of a hat set to borne goodness
Where's the power to do, in mere wishes and nothingness?
Lowly, I question that which is yet to be
When will it be that ought to be?
This hope and delay makes me daily weak 'n strong
When will it come his day of joyful song?
Oh, that my coast be enlarged
As the wide spread sky is discharged
Oh, that all around me be safe and blessed
May the good wishes manifest and in excess
To A Warrior's Creed, Valiant Death, Fate Oft Decrees
I follow the red line into hot, blazing Hell
with razor sharp long sword firm in my fighting hand
sending the devils down where their demon friends dwell
down, down deep, upon earth's surface I take my stand
I, raging fighter, with valiant blood in my veins
The Sun my only friend as its light clears my way
I leave behind me, nothing but huge bloody stains
I live as a warrior on a pittance of pay
A day's ration of bread and a bold flask of wine
few gold coins for every dark monster I slay
and the great favors of girlfriends, I daily dine
pride and Fate demands I die on some future day.
As life will be forfeit what care I of death's hand
no more than a bad-spit whisper the dying groan
To truth I am sworn, courageous is my dear stand
I am a valiant warrior, I dare fight alone.
My Lord, to an honorable death I so plead.
I lay here glad as away my life slowly bleeds.
Robert J. Lindley, Sonnet
Note- "The valiant brave die but one honorable death"
Poetic Whispering Of Dark, Calamitous Decrees
Alas! Such as dark, as need to atone
gashing curses of blackest dread,
cold in heartache as frozen stone,
is sad death of a love-life once bled!
Behold! Life once sailed forth all alone
with its shadows creeping behind,
my how- deep miseries hath grown,
into iron chains that so firmly bind!
Aghast! I enter brilliant light now shone
stand at eternity's first door,
where hath divine mercy now flown,
as I beg for forgiveness and much more!
Lo! Why cometh this low grievous tone
voiced in most damning decrees,
that black shall eat my dying bones,
as dark desires hath so well damned me!
R.J. Lindley, October 23rd, 1979
Rhyme, ( As Poe Once Within Midnight Dreams So Spoke To Me )
(Birthed As A Tribute to Edgar Allen Poe)
I Know Some Of Life's Sorrows, Fate Decrees Everlasting
I saw seven dying newborn white horses
I stumbled upon seventeen darken courses
I ran through twenty-seven ancient burnt temples
I found love may be hard, even when life is simple.
I sat at thirty-seven broken wooden tables
I listen intently to forty-seven mystical fables
I kissed sweetly fifty-seven kindhearted virgins
I sat in ocean fires with flaming tides surging.
I spoke sixty-seven times of my cravings
I cried out seventy-seven of my maddest ravings
I sang eighty-seven songs of death and devastation
I recall the best and worse of me without hesitations.
I wonder if hundred-seven years would be worth living
I think I need hundred twenty-seven years for forgiving
I beg for hundred thirty-seven days of deepest fasting
I know some of life's sorrows, Fate decrees everlasting.
R.J. Lindley, Sept 20th. 1976, December 11th, 2019
Rhyme, ( The Roads That Fate And Destiny Set Upon Us )
- Where the mystical shadow dances and blows.-
Waltzing Decrees
Waltz
with me
One
two, three
Count your steps
with ease
Waltz
with me
if you please
hands holding waist
gentle tease
Easy
that’s
my toes
soft spoken
whispered
pleas
Waltzing
breeze
It's called a "Waltz Wave" introduced by Kim Merryman on Blog.
It has 19 lines with the following syllable pattern:
1,2,1,2,3,2,1,2,3,4,3,2,1,2,3,2,1,2,1. You can split words to
make the syllables fit the pattern, if you please