Pure luscious wings of life are spread,
As
feathered days on dusty nights prepared,
To
herald now the passing of our slowly drifting years;
An
honouring of all that has been shared.
Surrendering
of day and known self,
Softened
folding, drape and fall of skin,
We
shed the images of old and sadly drooping dreams;
To
show the shape so long and truly hid.
What
lives behind the shining mask,
Ego-polished
with soft, worn rag of mind,
that
holds us, back,
with bright, death-awful glare;
Blinding
sight to what lies lost and rare.
Desire
to seek lies limply lost,
There
is no call to hear or strive to find,
No
dream that leads us on to mightier, noble truths;
We wait,
abandoned by the rule of mind.
https://dversepoets.com/2017/04/06/openlinknight-193/
https://dversepoets.com/2017/04/06/openlinknight-193/
There are far things worse that hell, there is the knowing it may exist. As they say, "Youth is wasted on the young." Very descriptive; convulsed and convoluted.
ReplyDeleteWell done~
I think any hell, if it exists, is here on earth. Life beyond is freedom and returning home.
DeleteThe lack of desire to seek is to be feared.
ReplyDeleteI don't think fear helps any situation. People reach times and stages in their lives when they no longer desire to seek, but, instead hold to a hermetic experience and that too is valuable.
DeleteThe repetition of 's' and 'l' sounds (particularly in the second stanza, but also throughout) gives that slurping, hanging, inertia-like feel to the poem, mimicking old age... Very clever!
ReplyDeleteSo well crated--I agree with findingtimetowrite--
ReplyDeleteOh I hope there is never lack of desire.. this is soo eloquent!!
ReplyDeleteNice description of the end of life especially the sense that the person who has died has been abandoned by "the rule of mind".
ReplyDeleteSadly true...your poem seems resigned to it; no use fighting?!
ReplyDeleteCadence is very good to read ~ To the end I would like this one:
ReplyDeleteAn honouring of all that has been shared.
It's so nice to read a poem that scans occasionally - I enjoyed this.
ReplyDeleteAlas... to be waiting at the end... I hope I can find new goals all the way to the end.
ReplyDeleteI find the closing stanza disturbing. I would like to think, at the end, I'm still seeking new experiences. I have always said I wanted my epitaph to be "What's Next?"
ReplyDeleteIt can be taken in a number of ways. Some people do not get to choose who or what they are in the end days.
DeleteSome people opt to forgo rule of mind and become more being than doing or thinking in the end days.
I did not feel this poem was about "Hell" and it seemed to me to refute "life beyond." I hear the rise and fall of one's existence in this poem from the first stanza , "Luscious wings of life are spread." Prepared to take flight and leave us to death that leads us to no mightier, noble truths. With the shedding of dreams, it seems we are left with nothing, and death is simply, "the end of life."
ReplyDelete