The Sacred Shall Weep and the Fallen Will Sing (Joseph Armstead)

...prelude...

Old light, from distant stars,
streams past the grime
coating the flawed surface
of broken stained glass,
windows on a corrupted
eternity,
a spotlight on
the Inquisition

i.  Prophecy & Maelstrom

On awakening, I see,
then I do not see,
eyes without lids blink
in occular caverns
carved in unfeeling flesh
--- such stigmata is vanity ---
while sacriligious images
foreshadow
the arrival of a dying day,
lumination unborn,
and a prickling of my psyche
predicting flames
from a dark furnace
where oracles burn

ii.  Intuition

Memories walk beside me,
whispering prayers
to forgotten deities,
and I stare
past the face of the clock,
arrythmic cosmic metronome,
and I plug my ears with fingers
stained with the ink
from forbidden books,
to unhear the heartbeat
of entropy fading...

I am not brave.
 

iii.  Mesmer & Schism

the opiate of the perverse,
these fevered dreams,
a contamination
flowing through fragile veins
of a population
of blind sheep
flocking under the glare
from a black-hole sun,
I plead for a return
to the unity of the whole --

a siren's call, hypnotic...

iv.   Delusion

progeny of lepers
dictate our hunger,
a perversity of appetite,
draining light
from the broken jewels
in a sundered crown,
and laughter, forced
through trembling lips
stitched shut,
pictures
at an infernal exhibition,
DeBussy filtered
through a peyote veil

v.  Rapture & Chaos

I cannot rest, this heady wine
is an addiction I cherish,
a conspiracy of scorn I drink
in greedy, hungry draughts,
and once inside,
feeling the nectar take root
like a cancer,
beginning its infestation
changing me, claiming me...

... redemptive narcosis ...

nowhere is the poisoned tongue
more inventive or seductive
than here, behind
the curtain of nightmare,
where, on awakening,
I see, but I do not see,
where, claiming consciousness,
but rejecting Divinity,
The Sacred shall weep
and the Fallen will sing

**********************************

Image courtesy of Dreamstime Photographic Stock: "Agony 2" by Sletse (Luc Sesselle), dreamstime_2108197.jpg

Comments

[Elaine]

This is a dark and elegant, epic poem that I find strangely seductive!