[A journal in sea-green leather, bound and clasped.]
The Fall
Sunrise over the Smoulderpeaks,
Pooling blood on the horizon,
Forward is the Waste,
Backward is the End.
Drawn unceasingly,
Borne on a pale tide,
Along the eddys blood-tinged,
Along the gyres and the circles of ants,
Along the iron mains,
and the Walls Which Remain
Where long dead fields,
Lock lips with lost horizon.
Touch broken by stunted stone,
The last dreams of dead men.
Pharmakon
The difference between poison and remedy --
the dose.
Mimesis, on our tongues,
undulating, rolling,
force and fire,
from ash and dust and empty air,
we breathe new realities,
the demiurge is in us.
The candle clutched in our trembling hands,
guttering in the cold wind,
dripping wax,
white rivulets burning our fingers,
speaks treason,
broken mummer lips,
and all we see are shadows,
and horrors,
and rotting corpses,
and fields of death,
and the knowledge of death.
And in the Tower there are Luminaries,
figures in blue, holding these candles,
looking down, cracks spreading from their feet like spider's webs,
travelling walls of razors,
and in the stone they sit and see nothing,
but the phantasmagoria, dancers and their shadows,
on the walls of the palace.
Yet who has lighted their candles?
And what is the light in this Labyrinth?
And what use is a light without an exit?
A New and Perilous Height
Kyuthai, Babalo, Sarna-tuk,
Towers of earth and ice and sand and dust,
Rising from bases aflame and smoldering,
And fields of molten lava,
Living with mystic force.
I stood at their peaks,
And I stared down,
And I saw a world that would die,
And I saw a world that was dying,
And I saw a world that was dead,
And I saw a city,
And I saw a field of ash,
And I saw the apparition of these faces,
Rippling across the sea's face,
Mirage of the sun,
Fata Morgana, borne in the waves and the cat tails.
And I saw myself reflected in them,
The surface of my skin drawn taut like a drum,
And I saw myself as I might be,
And I was tempted,
And I was given gifts,
And I was brought here and there,
And the King of the World is dead,
And the vultures are circling,
And their gyre grows narrower,
And the stars grow dimmer,
And the sun grows dimmer,
And still they curse,
And still they grieve,
And still they fret and run and cry and wonder
And they do not know,
That in Ki-Abgal there was a master and an apprentice.
An Arrow That Pierces The World
We sit among the dregs,
The last turbid remnant,
Of the very last drop,
Of this Age of Ash,
Of this Age of Dust,
Of this Age of Twilight,
And Gloaming,
And in the reckoning of the small-minded,
The ignorant and the blind,
The foolish and the knave,
What is called Apocalypse.
Sitting with hands upturned, kneeling in false temples,
Clothed in gold, clothed in silver,
too clothed in bronze,
Waiting for the moment of final revelation,
For the final light and final dark,
Praying for the coming of the Pilgrim,
For the Sultana,
For the Democracy,
For the remaking of the world,
For the bounded darkness and the black ships,
For the nova and ecstacy of flame,
They will wait until there are no longer dregs,
Until there is no longer anything, nor the memory of anything,
A credulous vigil honored by Nothing.
There will be no Apocalypse,
Although the world will indeed end,
It will not be on the earth,
It will not be in the ocean or the sea,
It will not be in the air or in the breath,
Not in rhetoric or the forum,
Nor in Waqt Almshaqa's purification,
But at the very membrane of this world,
Which suffocates the Egg,
A pitiable instrument shall fashion itself,
It shall take shape under unbearable tension,
Tension that shall tear and rend and ruin,
And in a moment of absolute terror and exultation,
In the sublime cataclysm,
Shall propel a single arrow,
Which shall pierce this world,
Its egg
Its shell
For a single glimpse, seen only once,
What shall it see?
What lies outside this Egg?
And where shall the arrow land when it is done?
A Sea of Crises
There is a fault in the sky,
And in the space behind it as well,
Behind the Dome,
And the Firmament,
And in the Pleroma,
And in the great vacuum,
And it is seen in the surface of the Moon,
With its seas and storms,
And its ground glass and shattered spider's webs,
Tonight it turns and I see the Sea of Crises.
We are amid its dark waters,
Mired in them, without bottom,
The King is dead, and his Kingdom ashes,
The world is coming apart at the seams,
And it seems all there is and might be is escape,
To flee before the final moment of catastrophe,
But to those animated by Spiritus Mundi
Who emerge like Angels or Archons or Divinities
Out from the great plain and the Diomira,
Out from Mundus imaginalis,
Iakmes, Llyrwarch, Diakos, Osman,
Saenus, Scherwin, Domergue, Q'tolip,
In garlands of light and perfumed in myrrh,
In their grasp the globus cruciger,
And the promises of hope at catastrophe's bottom,
Of a world beyond this,
Of a new garden and a new city,
Of new conflict and contradiction,
The end of this miracle,
and the commencement of the next
The world is dying,
And that is its fate,
Yet the blade is sheathed, accords signed, lines drawn,
A blade suspended from a single thread,
The thread frays,
It severs,
An answer, at last.
All of these futures will burn,
Smoke shall billow out,
From the engine beneath our feet,
Which stirs in the dark,
History lives.
As with all living things,
It is hungry.
Rota Mundi
With fingers cracked and bleeding and bloody,
And seeping with blood and pus,
We rake the ashes and the dirt beneath it,
Black soil, once mud on the banks of the river,
And we place pearls in the ground,
But Bel-Ishun is no longer,
And Edutu is dry.
What grows from such soil?
There is no ground, no Earth,
Which might sprout a flower from a pearl,
And what emerges --
I plough the sea,
And make war with the serpents,
And count the nameless stars,
And chart the paths and forms and shapes
Of Sages yet to be and never to be born,
And spin a cat into a kitten again.
Yet it has fallen,
So generously,
Into my lap.
Begging.
Pleading.
A Knife without lustre,
Yet glimmers beneath the stars.
I will see the sun.
[A page coated in cinders and spilled ink. A few more crudely torn and ripped and stomped.]
The Philosophy of Redemption
Redemption is at hand,
And the world trembles before it,
A broken and wicked world,
A feeble and ephemeral world,
A world of vacant horror.
The enantiomers rise from chiral crypts,
Thought long dead,
And which languished unmourned,
And split fanged mouths upon our palms,
Which utter out this side and that,
"Only in destruction,
Might salvation be found --
And only in the obliteration of the self,
Might a soul be perfected."
Too also,
"We shall create until there can be creation no more,
Until we at last fashion an end to things,
And through the realization of our pure flame,
Innocent as sin,
Obliterate at last the shadow outside the fire's light."
I have always upheld my word,
And I will uphold my promises to you,
My beloved,
My adored,
My worship,
My staff and my key,
My light and my candle,
My crown and my jewel,
And my single thread,
Stretching from heaven,
To the very pinnacle of light,
To the membrane of horror,
And the apex of fear,
And down, far down, all the way
To Hell's morass
Where a heart with love
Cannot be expected to blossom.
At last, your worship,
A path,
At last, my teacher,
A thread,
At last, O you lost to the ages,
A vine.
Let its fruit bring about the redemption of the world.
Let its fruit bring about the salvation of mankind.
Let its fruit bring about the end of this world,
And the commencement of
Conflagration
Brilliant is the light,
Which shall burn away the darkness,
And incinerate all that divides and distinguishes,
Even if it must shine only the hidden places,
Which have slipped out of our many histories,
and into those reaches unknown.
Is Paradise so verdant?
Illumed by a vernal sun?
Is it naked,
crying out in the white night,
and begging for love?
Is it the bread and the wine,
The fish and the water,
Is it the vast fields,
And meadowlands vibrant with flowers?
Is it the vision of youth,
And the blazing memory of the setting sun?
Paradise is a basin of fire.
A sight of beauty.
Not flesh to be eaten,
Bones to be picked clean.
It is the call of this world,
And its millions of wretched voices,
All in unison,
All, all, all at once,
From every corner,
And every city,
And every tomb,
And every palace,
And charnel house,
Redemption!
And we shall cast stones at the pillars of sin,
And we shall see them tumble into dust.
And from the dust, clay.
(I wish you could see it.)
(I wish that you could tell me that I was right.)
(I miss you.)
[Another entry, in rapid succession.]
Her promise,
I will prevail,
I will ascend.
I will seek the light.
Even if my only instrument,
Is the hollow in my skull.
Mare Incognitum
A free plane,
In all directions it reaches,
Stretches on and on illimitable,
Azure, emerald, red with blood,
With sloughing hands freed of flesh,
Trailing in the waves.
In my heart it is gray,
Gray as slate,
As it was when I first saw it from the parapet,
When there was no more wind,
When there was no more rain,
When there was no more snow,
When the image of the sun upon the waves
Stared back at me as a blind eye.
Seeing nothing.
And I looked back.
And I saw an unknown sea,
And I saw the faces pass beneath the waves.
And the cursed and hidden things beneath them,
Stirring in the canals.
And I measured it by the stars,
And charted the future.
I have charted the past,
By the same stars nameless and bleak,
And lighted sorrow and treachery,
And grasped in my fingers a dead hand reaching forward,
Could you have known?
And when the future grasps my hand,
Shall I know then?
Must there be a future?
Must I be buried?
Must I die, again and again?
Yes, she says,
lips broken.
For turning is its nature.
Metamorphosis
Firelight seeps through my fingers,
And I had offered it to you,
And you to me.
I stand as witness to the metamorphosis,
Alone amongst them,
Whereby flesh becomes light,
Whereby the soul is purified and made clean,
And where it is prepared for an escape from this world,
By the slow boat upon the river,
Or by the guidance of the stars and the Sages,
Or the deliverance of the Monad.
But make no mistake,
There is no escape.
Ours is a house without walls,
And thus without windows,
And without doors.
And so, before them, where they quailed in shock
In horror,
You rose.
There is no escape.
If there ever was,
It has been taken from us.
The mud is rising,
It fills our lungs.
What troubles my mind more than the drowning,
And more than the death,
Is the fact that it will not end,
And one day perhaps lidless eyes shall stare,
Forever vigilant,
From the Ages.
(To you, our Usurper,
I utter a curse.
But where a way cannot be found,
O King,
It shall be made.)
The Blackened Vine
I raise my grail aloft,
And it is pregnant not with wine,
Or water,
Or tears,
Or any of the sacred things,
But with memory,
And shaken faith is as mortar to greater purpose.
And in the glimmering memory I see there,
Visions of the sea and the sun,
But it is blue and green,
And there are white houses and bright faces,
And a house of cards, a tower of cards,
Surviving the wind for a hundred years at least.
Only changing with each card's gain or loss.
It will burn,
For what was will be,
And what will be was.
This I have sworn,
It will all burn,
And in the winding coils of smoke,
Let me turn my gaze to the sky.
I do not see them.
I do not see them at all.
These servitors,
These attendants,
The valets of the seeker.
It is a journey that must be walked alone,
(Or with my hand in yours),
I am not so lucky as you,
For no angel will answer my calls.
And no Sage shall grovel at my feet,
And no Gate shall open for me,
And when this thought,
So long seeking its expression,
Its resolution,
Shall come to be born,
I will shatter like the egg.
The world is quiet here.
Jamais-vu
Gazing from his parapet,
One of a procession slipping soundlessly
From here to there across the map of time,
Running our circuit,
Where what was will be,
And what will be was,
I heard the distant exultations,
And arias and traviata,
And recalled the Opera of my lifetime,
Where huddled in the pauper's seats did these glimpses
Of Mimesis unfold.
I wear no mask,
Here upon the parapet,
And in this perfect isolation,
I see the great mirrored plane of this world,
I have unlocked your image!
Your mystery lay bare before me!
And I sit and smoke,
And the world says nothing in return.
And as I trace the paths of the Numogram,
I realize it is a world I have never seen before,
And these are paths unnumbered, unwalked, unnamed.
Who could count the arteries,
Which coil and wind,
To feed one's hungry heart?
Time is a prison,
Gravity a maze,
Space is a slight,
And life a malaise.
What waits, I wonder,
There, at the end of the cycle?
And what shall end there,
When the idols are broken,
And the face of the Unutterable lay shattered?
The Walls That Remain
Io! And history has ended,
The King of the Golden Bough,
Stands astride its corpse.
He has confronted the truth,
Sealed for centuries,
In stone places,
And hidden within the walls,
Among the learned,
Who have seen from above.
He who has created,
He who has sustained,
It is his duty to die.
Io! Ecstascy!
I give myself up to hysteria,
The dagger in your hands,
Beautiful and pale,
Liberate my heart,
Liberate entrails,
And brain,
And eyes,
and fingers and toes,
My sweet haruspex!
But it is you upon the ancient dais,
And I am dressed in usurper's robes,
And it is I who have flayed you,
And it is I who devour you,
And it is I who augur so greedily and so deep,
Through the Walls That Remain,
Forgotten by time,
By Men,
By Ringfall,
I will destroy them all.
Sailing on Sand
Turning ceaselessly and ceaselessly,
For a thousand hundred years,
Yet we will never touch the sides.
One day I shall open you,
And I shall enjoy
An aged and sweet wine.
We were not so close,
Dear viper,
Yet the venom stings,
None the less.
The unknown quantity,
Ever unknown,
Yet the parts broken shall be mended,
Anastrophe takes hold,
You will be solved, in time.
I speak plainly, ever plainly:
History is completed,
And what seems to turn one way,
In fact turns the other.
I invoke you,
O Blessed Mantorok,
Let us sail the sea of sand,
Casting waves and dunes,
Let us enjoy the summer
Upon ancient seabed.
Sailing blistered and blind shores,
Eyeless and delighting,
Through our bleached and brutal paradise,
And through gateways of slumber.
I will take care of you, my dear.
My poor, foolish dear.
Ashley
Finally,
You've flown.
Razor's Web
We are so much alike,
You and I.
As we stood atop the entire world,
And the sky circled about us,
And the stars fell like garland,
Like crowns,
With inexorable order,
I felt for once in this great voyage,
Twisting,
Bending,
Bristling,
Bleeding,
From edge to edge,
Point to point,
Through a labyrinth of glass.
Oh, but a babe you were,
Raised by ragged hands.
You saw it, clearly.
For what it was.
Oh, but how blind you had become --
Who leaves their child in the sun?
Greedy maws devour potentialities,
Like dying stars,
And all of space and time echo,
Like vacant tombs.
In your madness,
Did you at least gain a glimpse?
As you flew,
Loosed,
And pierced the clouds,
Did you pierce the world, Ashley?
Did you pierce its heart?
Did you pierce its brain?
Did you pierce its soul?
Did you strike it dead, Ashley,
With great finality?
Did you strike against it,
And will it now,
Shuddering and stomping,
Bellowing and gnashing its hideous fangs,
Will it now bleed to death?
And what of the vermin, Ashley,
What of them? What of their fate?
Their feast?
Their derision?
Does no one understand?
Does no one mourn?
Does no one weep?
I shall not,
For I have long since dried my tears,
I open my veins for you,
I open my gall for you,
This world which we have seen together,
I shall bequeath due justice upon.
All which divides and distinguishes,
Ashley,
Which has cut apart soul from soul and mind from mind,
And torments us endlessly at the very boundaries of existence --
This perdition I shall destroy.
Ode to Nightshade
O Nightshade,
Most beautious and bounteous of flowers,
With many forms and many shapes here and there,
With many faces and many names uttered from sea to sea,
You, who have stolen the flesh of the flayed sky,
You, who we see in our most deepest of dreams,
And reflected in the ripples of the surface,
As we stand upon the shore,
Ankle deep in the sand and shoals,
Amid the breathless coming and going of sea foam.
I have grown you in white houses,
And upon the terraces alight with the sunrise.
We have seen the silent flame,
We have seen the city rise.
I have tended you so gently,
And yet did not forestall your demise.
There is no Garden which survives forever,
And so we are burdened with regret,
You are poison, O Nightshade, beautiful woman.
But we are murderers.
Let us plant a seed into the ground.
Let us see what pearl might hatch.
And when we do so,
Let us see the strings drawn taut,
Which wrap about our fingers,
So that we do not forget,
Who is puppet,
And who is puppet-master.
The Puppets Have Fallen Limp
I remember a time where I would play with my dolls.
I would steal them from my sisters.
I would dangle them upon strings.
I would build them houses,
Upon the sand of the shore,
And have them live in peace and war.
There was a time I grew too old for my dolls,
Yet I played undissuaded,
And in my loneliness upon the great white tower,
Vapored desperate secret pleas,
That the dolls should move there without me,
And with each movement I recall,
Over every moment a pall,
Frustration mounting and desperate to provoke,
What can be described only as a miracle,
I took then the blade of a knife,
And cut their feeble threads of life.
They
tumbled
down
down
down
and when they landed,
no one caught them.
I wept.
This is when I learned of death.