Tag: writing

Fall’s Kingdom

~ SW Altair ~ 3 Comments

On the first day of your claim,
a newborn raises his fist to the faraway trumpets
sounded for the triumphant return of October.

A league of white doves, oracles from the east,
adorn your royal robe with rain-soaked wreaths.
Before the trembling days and the darkened horses,
there are rivers, bright stars, and you

of pulpy lips and fecund breasts,
from which milk of nacre flows,
and fattened squash tumble down
into the palms of our arid endurance.

Your hair is golden as the maple leaves;
your breath is the scent of an apple orchard;
your earlobes, sweet
as the ripened grapes hanging from heaven’s vines,
have been kissed and kissed
by the doting peasants.

On your brow rests the throne of a butterfly,
dignified and full of sunlight.
Those beating wings reign over your vision.
We shall never despair.
We shall never die for want of another lilac
for as long as your courage perseveres.
The hapless take refuge under your sleeves;
the unworthy flee like indignant black moths.
Only one remains. Only one remains.
He is the great oak beneath the harvest moon.
As he bows to your grace, acorns fall to their deaths,
a season’s offering, a tribute to your life.

Your Kingdom.

 

Originally published on September 20th, 2015 on my old blog. 

Fourth Piece

~ SW Altair ~ 5 Comments

She was made of ringlets of laughters,
made of the scent of an apple orchard.
She was the quiet ripples of endless summers nights,
and her dress was drenched in sweet wine.
Purple poured into drunken purple.
She was made of all good things
that slipped through my fingers.
And I was made to love no one
but her.

The Tavern

~ SW Altair ~ 1 Comment

At the edge of an atlas,
by the border of desert cactus,
stands the lonely tavern.
An unhinged door, moth-eaten lanterns,
and chock-full of dirty feathers.

The sky is a piece of dry cloth.

You move through a generation
of peanut shells.
Abandoned cocoons
fossilized in amber lamplights,
childless, unmoving.

The tavern’s usual patrons
travel from one end to another
in the hourglass’ desert, sifting
through god’s thinning fingers
between each dissipating hour.

The barkeep settles your tab,
five full tankards for five full lies.
There is no salvation for the dried-up souls,
only rum and gin and
an apple

for the the drunken crow.
With a pair of blotched wings,
it flies to the fevered moon, pale-faced,
bearing a glass coffin,

clear as vodka.

 

originally published on September 14th, 2015 on my old blog. 

Third Piece

~ SW Altair ~ 4 Comments

She practiced her love on every ugly toad,
casually tossing I-love-yous
into the gaping mouths
of those desperate souls.
With each rehearsed declaration, she felt a new sensation,
an unknown tenderness that she carefully learned,
treasured and saved
for the prince.
But those words, uttered too many times,
have slowly swelled up her tongue,
until it grew so prodigious
that she could not close her lips.
So she waited for her prince,
with a gaping mouth,
ugly and desperate,
completely ignored and detested
by her fellow toads.

Second Piece

~ SW Altair ~ 2 Comments

I have nothing to give you, my love,
but a jar of my melted laments.
Be still, it’s too hot to touch.
Shapeless sorrows as such
will burn harder than you remember.
Put it up on the shelf, my love,
it will be there forever.
Let’s smile and drink wine today and
let’s not destroy
that remaining sensibility
of the pointed finger.