They understood we were immortal
that we could never naturally die
and that we suffered for it

And they asked,

“You say that you can never naturally die
and that you suffer for it

“If this is so,
why not surrender up to death
and end
insomnia of the soul?”

Why not surrender up to death
well, you must understand
that we are humankind
from Earth
our most noble moments
are our most perverse

We seek always to oppose the flow
that naturally surrounds us
and in opposition hope to find
a sense of freedom
in the mind

The word
Forbidden
is what lures us most
to highest peak
or deepest pit

If there’s a wall that promises safety
we search for the crack
within which throbs and glows
that spark
that draws us on

To crack wide the black threshold
feel the charms fall away
know the zenith
in rising
chase chimes, bells
in zero weather
for the germ of an intimate truth
or a moment of wisdom
in false-bottomed holes
that drop away clear
to the shadowless noon
dark-pitted
with shattered grate
those bars
that entangle sight
and stars
whose minds

glisten

past the cold, or the crazy
or the slow-turning cipher that spells time
in a low childish
self-absorbed hum