The House of the Dead

28 July 2023

He had only begun to understand
when lightning came to slice the branch
clean off the bough. It wouldn't matter anyhow
without her or the scent of her still lingering
as though to ask a question though afraid.
It wouldn't matter, as all ages past can fail
to mean a thing, unlike the scent of one
familiar flesh, though this place houses souls.
I ask for a friend what purpose has redemption
after love, for who regrets the love? The pain,
indeed regrettable, will satisfy Osiris, who,
by any other name, enlists the dead
into the legions of sweet peril, lost
in strife, lest loss of love revive their ire.
Tell me, Pharaoh, whether any Isis waits
to mock the dead back into living forms?

--

Come again, sweet spirit, to my chamber,
whence these dreams enlist the tumult
of the darkened days of man
to find what gems were left behind
beneath the pile of burning coals.
Come and wander to the bottom
whence death carries all who dare,
but do take care -- you are not one of them
just yet. I ask your help. This excavation
will take years, and we have time to sit and chat
about what might have been. I'll tell you,
there are many things to learn, but few to love,
and by that God who lives above one suffers bitterly,
but what is to be done remains obscure.

--

Perhaps begin by thinking on new avenues,
then stopping to inquire why these structures, why this order.
But do not be late for dinner, which revives you,
like the hero back from Lethe in the dream of old,
for this is where hope lies. We are in chains, it has been said,
but now with sun-parched eyes we look again and see
the cave itself in motion, hurling madly through the void.
Will all things be destroyed? And are the chains themselves
our safety during impact? How much Freedom does a man need?
And who else could do our work, and do it well?

--

Come let us mock the automatons
and the free spirits, with equal measure.