I
We are the hallowed men
We are the fearless men
Clustered together
Hearts filled with doubt. Oh.
Our tired utterances, when
We confer together
Are stifled and disordered
As sobs in the night
Or a child forgotten and wandering
In a carnival of mirrors
Aim without focus, death without desire
Bridled action, rage without respite
Those who have watched
With desperate eyes, our simple strategies
Remember us- if at all- not as desolate
Jaded children, but only
As the hallowed men
The fearless men
II
Burdens I can bear with decorum
In fantasy's effervescent realm
These are not tangible
Here, my burdens are
Pressure on the corners of my eyes
Here, an earthly load is crushing
And youth is
In a torrent of commands
More a memory and a dream
Than a desultory lifetime
Let me be no longer
In a field splashed with scarlet
Let me also shed
Such disdainful defilements
False titles, baseless worship, misplaced faith
In me
Grieving as a mother grieves
No longer.
Not that last crusade
Bordering on a docile holocaust
III
This is a chess game
This is a disingenuous game
Here the actuality
Is nebulous, here we collect
The facts in whispers and murmurs
From those who avoid his manipulations
Is it like this
In a world far removed
Demanding perfection
In the days when we are
Aching with exhaustion
Eyes that would shine
Glaze jade with despair
IV
The purpose is not here
There is no purpose here
In this multitude of ancient children
In this empty fidelity
These whetted shards of our forsaken virtue
On this last pilgrimage
We sing together
And shun thought
Flanked in perfect formation with wands drawn
Voiceless, unless
The opponent harmonizes
As a wavering note
A cry for a covenant
Of marble and onyx
The lone demise
Of a beloved son
V
Rock-a-bye baby on the tree top
When the wind blows the cradle will rock
When the bough breaks the cradle will fall
And down will come baby, never to crawl
Between the diversion
And the saturnine
Between the secrecy
And the divulgence
Falls the Hero
For thee would I have died, my son
Between the image
And the illusion
Between the betrayal
And the vengeance
Falls the Hero
Salaam
Between the triumph
And the ruin
Between the shame
And the scandal
Between the welcoming
And the exile
Falls the Hero
For thee would I have died, my son
For thee would
Salaam
For thee would I
This is the way the slaughter ends
This is the way the slaughter ends
This is the way the slaughter ends
Not with a curse but a consciousness