Inheriting Eden
I come to my senses a little every day,
to lose myself with the morning.
I have no country and know no flag
My morality, in body bags
lies at the foot of the stairs,
under the sputtering oil lamp
my grandfather first lit in infancy.
A tiger moth flutters,
Beats its wings as it beats its forehead
Hot glass, burning flame, searing light
Gloomy foot steps echoing down the corridor
Half closed doors, half open windows
Half told lies, half buried truths
As the wind blows through
A song of echoes, a hiss of regret
The rain, the rain
Cleanses all, changes all
Seasons.
Autumn comes,
the brown fog of a reluctant morning
in the wake of recalcitrant night
under the jibes of the moon
the scorn of the sun
taunting.
Haunting, everything so haunting
So tauntingly inviting
So indifferent to anything relevant
Relevant but distant
Distant and transient
Everything real but not real enough
Like a dream that is not a dream
But a misted reality
Under the brown fog of morning.
My heart is a red rock
My soul is waste
My mind, bridging the Styx
A paradox of simple complexity
Bridging worlds inside worlds,
rooms without windows, doors without walls,
fields of scarecrows to scare away fertility
'Mother, oh mother why have you forsaken me?'
Is this it? My legacy, my Eden?
A field of burgeoning mushrooms
A grove of wilting vine
Mine, mine, mine,
A horror, a nightmare,
But mine.
Carlos
Copyright ©
Carlos Debattista
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