Of Broken Dreams
I am witness to the cold, stone statue
Shedding a miraculous tear
On behalf of an estranged world,
Amidst sacred voices that speak
not,
And where fear breathes its last
To the melancholy beat of
nothingness.
The people made the choice, I say,
Of death and of life, drawing
lots,
Unmindful of the complaints of the
dead.
The expectation of a bitter kiss
And at some point thirty pieces
returned,
That's all that can be hoped for,
Or would you rather the stench
Of those numbered among the
living?
I am no Iscariot; I resent the
comparison.
But I would happily point Him out,
with a kiss;
I would, and without the mawkish
guilt.
So here we are planting dainty
illusions
And reaping mil-dewed despair,
Sowing calculated and thought-out
hope
And harvesting withered promises
In a parched, unyielding, and
bitter land,
Where the cry of the oppressed is
eviscerated
And justice is merely an
inconvenience.
And so continues the unabated
boredom,
Without compensation for carrying
crosses.
You misunderstand me, as usual;
I am no prophet of doom; it's
unfashionable.
I shed the Lamb's clothing ages
ago.
Or was it Sheep's clothing?
Perfidious.
They are still there in my pocket,
Those dismantled dreams undreamt,
The broken remains of hope long
lost
And trapped beneath a sordid
gravestone
From which not even a tear can
flow.
I struck it twice with a rod -- and
nothing.
And yet we persist, clinging,
holding on,
Etherized by a moment's ephemeral
pleasure
Only to be reawakened again, all
too soon, to life.
Shall we then raise misguided
prayers from ashes?
Shall we build sepulchers from
broken-down churches?
O lasting and abiding city, we
seek thee,
There in the cold earth beneath,
we seek thee,
Where nought discriminates, where
exists
Neither young or old, rich nor
poor,
Uncomely nor beautiful, ignorant
nor wise,
The hopeful nor the hopeless, the
good nor the evil,
But only the hapless race of
humanity,
Who for all its faults, desires to
be loved still.
And so, be kind to the dead, O Son
of Man,
Awake us not, but let us sleep;
We beseech Thee, let us sleep.
By
Ric Couchman
August Twentyfirst