creeping through the lengthening dark
a shadow springs: like a man,
like something born to hunt,
but in the early night it is distorted
and i am left to race my throbbing heart.
the moon beds low and lean
though by my end it is plump and ripe
and ready to be harvested
by these numb and unworthy hands.
i was not born a hunter,
not like those reaching silhouettes,
i have sleuthed my way about this life
in search of an honest fen.
i had no way of knowing
that my life could lead to this:
chasing the very nightmare which woke me
from the gentle hands of that dewy glen.
what is a girl to do?
when none of her day dreams
will faithfully see her through
as she has piously devoted of them,
all that remains is the siren night.
though it has become something cliche,
there is no denying that enticing air,
that chill cloak descending so naturally
as to whisk one away on whistling whims,
to lure weary eyes to every tiny glint.
the night comes in seven seals,
just like any revelation:
a white horse, that grinning moon
a red horse, her tumultuous skirts
that billow and burn as she comes
a black horse, the climax of those tearing pleats
a pale horse, that is the north star
finally alighting on the peak of the hour.
the fifth becomes me: that poor soul, crying out
given a robe made white by the presence of dark itself
and as i don such divinity in all of my stupor
i am faced with the earthquake:
the rush of the sleeping sun
that smiles in his distant dreaming,
the wide white horse like a shinning fruit
that glistens with his ardent luster,
and every single budding star
that beads up on the swirling skirts
and tantalizes all my worshiping
with their dripping eyes so very far away
and hopelessly prone to falling
without the barest acknowledgement.
then comes the seventh seal--always.
no matter the nuance or dedication
the silence descends upon myself;
upon the distant embroidered stars
and the far-off heaven to which they fall.
it hardly lasts a minute---
let alone half an hour---
but that stillness i religiously succumb to
feeds the noise inside i cannot quit,
like the pitch of a fiery fever
it breaks at that most transient peak of night.
the sun sets all the sooner these days
and even my dreaming is made unfulfilled
by the frost and the monotony of this life,
so i chase that shrouded seraphim
on her linen robes of purple and red,
hunting for her tumbling stars
as she sanctimoniously looses each one
from the tresses of such well-worn linen
like crystal tears from a cheerful martyr.
i bow to and pray upon each rapturous seal
as it reveals itself to me,
bereft of trumpets or angels
or anything potentially godlike:
i become that very night
every chance i get to escape into her,
and i am not a hunter, not like god
or like the devil or even that blissful sun,
i forage for that spiritual release
only the darkness can allot,
that adrenaline i can glean when hiding
from all the obligations of my wasting days.
the eighth seal is when i retreat inside again,
and the ninth when my eyes throw up their arms
and tuck me in beneath the imminence
that i must face the sun once again.
