Rack
a requiem
... slow and seeping climbs the sun
and sky-lit blue inside is grey when day is good
and black when not. But black too bright, a darker colour yet I feel,
feeling black is easy now, I fear the light for blacker still it makes the night.
... what loss is there in solitude when blacker still descends the mood,
that women's warmth is unbestowed yet slams again another door,
while ease escapes and leaves the void for worse things starkly slide,
to hide inside.
... inside, where ague twists the cords 'twixt ache and pain
while shadows fall and fall again,
and false friends lift and let you fall, and fall and fall again.
... and fall again to crash in pain alone against the sere grey sky,
no gold no coin no money's worth just for me the cold wet earth.
The dry leaves drifting down, soon wet and cold, wind driven, freezing,
all come to end with pain throughout and soul that twists to flee the rout,
joints afire then shocked with cold, each escape to something worse.
... is love bought cheap a love at all, is love bought dearer better,
is faith a way to blame the gods, with someone else to curse
for all these man-made things are gloss, but can't disguise plain pain,
that needles inwards, pulling tearing stretching tight,
... life is the rack. Sometimes we hold it distant but only for a while
and growing age bestows its gnarling wand while death does not come
still more we wish it would but drugs and science hold us here
sometimes in worse pain sometimes not,
... till thread snap and darkness fall that last time
to never lift to leave us sleep with peace where all was pain
and body stop and power fail and mind desist
so the blacker blackness that I love can come
... and stay.
Copyright © 2003 Peter Leon Collins
v2, 4/10/2003