LA TRISTESSE DURERA (Scream To A Sigh)

The day turns black
as a million bats cloud the sky
like dark seraphim,
like the last autumn leaves
blowing in a chill wind,
like dead night falling on a scarecrow city
where the doe-eyed boy rises free
the blood soaked bricks and stumbles
through a wilderness of random purgatory.

Awake in the new light he runs through
psychedelic meadows of infinite destinies.
Upon the fresh breeze he catches a brief whiff
of heaven after a rain,
under the golden rose of the fading sun
purple thistles sway in
fields of forgotten forevers.
In the twilight he touches the mad unicorn
and sees a vision of
the girl with hair like the wind
and all she was, and he knows
he must return.

Back to the city bathed in complete obsidian,
he sees her through opaque cloud passings
of a blind moon,
he sees her in blinks of violent violet lightning
atop the gargoyled roof of a church.
She writhes in mournful abandon,
the keening of her faded soul piercing the sky,
her fingers scraping clouds with rasps of thunder.
To her she was the goddess of loss and longing
in throes of tragic need.
To him she was the eye of the storm
staring at what she could not see
through the chaos.

The doe-eyed boy climbs up,
spreading wings of gossamer feathers,
soaring heavenward to take in his arms
the girl with hair like the wind
and dance in storm crescendo
beyond dark purrs of dying thunder,
a rising rhapsody of heart murmurs
in the dream starred night.

In an ecstatic epiphany
bare flesh against flesh,
mouths meet, tongue caresses tongue
and she feels the healing gash on his
and thinks, This must be the hole
to his heart-thoughts.
To him it was the man-snake
seeking the warm wet womb haven.

Returning to the silent streets,
snowflakes drift down like bone and eggshell,
like white gauze covering earthly wounds.
They stand together, like lovely vampires,
like marble icons under a luminous moon
bathing the country-side in soft blue serenity.

Alive in this lucid milieu,
saturated with cognizant dreams
they stand breathing exhilaration,
hearts melting the air with
burning songs of passion and rapture
sung only by
the angels
and
the insane.

November 24, 28, 1997/August 22, 1998

(This is a companion piece to the poem THE BEAUTIFUL ONES FADE.There is also a third piece that completes this trilogy, though each piece can be taken seperately)