Category: Poetry

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Odyssey

A measureless span of time had passed since I last made landfall.

My ship and shipmates had long ago been claimed by a maelstrom, leaving me alone upon an oarless, sail-less wooden vessel adrift upon a black and endless sea. Exhausted and starving, I drifted in and out of consciousness, waiting for death to claim me.

I awoke with a violent jolt. The boat had grounded upon a sandbar.

Weak and trembling, I climbed over the side. The land was slick and black, coated in foul-smelling slime that reeked of fish and decay. Each step sank into the gelatinous surface, making progress slow and exhausting.

The sandbar stretched endlessly in every direction, featureless and barely rising above the waterline.

Without warning, the ground gave way beneath me.

I slid helplessly down a steep incline, skidding across the slime-covered surface before plunging into waist-deep black water thick as oil.

Struggling onward, I waded through the darkness.

As I advanced, a great cliff slowly emerged from the depths before me, rising higher and higher until it towered overhead. In my weakened state the climb was torturous, each handhold earned through sheer determination.

Eventually I hauled myself onto a dry volcanic plateau.

The landscape was barren.
No trees, no birds, no life.
Only a colossal volcano rising from the centre of the island.
Toward it I travelled.

At the mountain’s base stood a vast stone archway carved directly into the rock. Set within it was an immense wooden door blackened with age.

The volcano rumbled deep beneath the earth.
The air smelled of sulphur and ash.
Fire crackled somewhere beyond the stone.

I pounded upon the door.
For a long moment nothing happened.
Then the door slowly opened.
Darkness waited beyond.
I stepped inside.

The great door closed behind me with a thunderous boom.
The sound of iron locks echoed through the cavern.
Ancient earth filled my lungs.
Following a solitary stone path through the darkness, I eventually arrived at a pair of towering doors.

I pushed them open and was blinded by light.
Before me stretched a paradise beyond imagining.
A vast garden overflowing with impossible beauty.
Ancient trees heavy with fruit.
Crystal streams winding through emerald grass.
Waterfalls tumbling into clear pools.
Flowers blooming in colours I had no names for.

For hours, or perhaps days, I wandered that place.
I ate sweet fruits. Gathered nuts and mushrooms.
Drank from cool streams and sparkling falls.
For the first time since the sea had claimed my world, I felt peace.

Eventually weariness overtook me.
I lay beneath an apple tree.
The grass was soft, the breeze was warm.
And I surrendered myself to sleep.
An impossible sleep.

When I finally awoke, the scent of apples had vanished.
The scent of disinfectant filled the air.
I opened my eyes into a white room.
Cold, sterile, and empty.
Leather restraints bound my wrists and ankles to a chrome-framed bed.
A barred window admitted only a thin shaft of grey daylight.
Across from me stood a heavy metal door.
Locked, beyond it echoed the screams of madmen,

Suddenly a hatch snapped open.
A pair of eyes appeared.
Watching, studying, judging.
Then the hatch slammed shut once more.

The silence that followed was deafening.
I lay motionless, staring at the ceiling.
Trying desperately to remember.
Had I truly drifted across a black and endless sea?
Had I climbed the volcanic island?
Had I walked among the gardens of paradise?
Had any of it been real?
Or had this room been my world all along?

And if so…

Why did I still miss the ocean?

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Where the Ocean Meets the Stars

I find myself adrift upon an endless ocean,
Slick black waters cradling my pale body,
In a deathlike embrace.

Above me, countless stars burn within the darkness,
Their reflections shimmering upon the motionless sea,
As currents carry me farther from shore,
Farther into the dreaming deep.

The waters are calm,
Warm,
Unthreatening.

And from distant coral reefs,
I hear the choirs of sirens,
Their mournful songs drifting across gentle waves.

As I journey outward,
The stars seem to draw ever closer,
Until sea and sky become one,
And the horizon dissolves.

There, reality folds upon itself.

The ocean becomes the heavens,
And I find myself drifting once more,
Not upon black waters,
But through an inky sky,
Looking down upon the world below.

Beneath me, raven-haired sirens dance among the waves,
Beautiful,
Mesmerising,
And terribly deadly.

As I pass above them,
I glimpse the great serpent Grimvael,
His immense body coiling through the abyss,
Black scales twisting in the depths beneath the sea.

Though I drift safely among the stars,
His presence fills me with dread.

So I close my eyes,
And surrender to the current.

Carried ever onward,
Until my forlorn heart is delivered home,
To the quiet comfort of my bed.

There I lie,
Neither fully awake,
Nor fully asleep,
Lingering for a moment,
Between two worlds.

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Fourteen Days to Dream

For fourteen days this June, creation has filled my senses,
Ideas gathering like storm clouds upon the horizon,
Each thought colliding with the next,
Sparking brightly against the architecture of my mind.

For fourteen days I have walked among possibilities,
Turning fragments into stories,
Dreams into landscapes,
And whispers into worlds.

The tide of stress has temporarily withdrawn,
Leaving the fertile sands of creativity exposed,
And for a fleeting moment,
The mind can breathe.

The great serpent Grimvael has retreated,
Coiling himself within his lightless pit,
His black scales hidden from thought and memory.

For now, his icy tendrils do not reach,
His suckered grasp does not cling
To old wounds and forgotten sorrows.

And in his absence,
The mind dares once more
To dream,
To imagine,
To create.

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Lure of Dreamland

Sleep tempts me early this evening.

Rain pours steadily through the darkness outside,
While the wind rattles the house,
Causing the trees to hiss and whisper.

The winter air is cold and unfriendly,
A chill that presses against the glass,
Seeking entry.

I sit alone,
Listening to it all.

Sleep has come calling.

Ghostly fingers gently lower my eyelids,
Their touch patient,
Persistent.

I sit at my desk,
Warm beside the heater,
My thoughts growing heavy.

Yet still my head resists,
Fighting the summons of the Dreamlands,
Where emerald oceans glisten beneath starlit skies,
And strange vessels wander moonlit shores.

The rain continues to fall.
The wind continues to hiss through trees.
And sleep waits quietly,
Knowing it will win.

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Nothing

Today I feel nothing.
I do not feel bad,
Nor do I feel good.
I drift somewhere between the two,
Indifferent to it all.

Yet I feel confused.
A little numb to my surroundings,
As though I stand just outside myself,
Watching the world move past.

I no longer feel the lure of creation
As I have these past two weeks,
Those fruitful days
Filled with stories, dreams, and possibility.

Now everything feels…
Quiet.
As though I have nothing to say.
Yet at the same time,
I desperately want to have something to say.

It is a peculiar emptiness,
A silence without peace,
A stillness without comfort.

And perhaps that is the source of my confusion.
Not sorrow.
Not joy.
Only the absence of both.

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Ship of Fools

Beneath the slumbering ebony sky,
The sleepwalker languidly shuffles,
Their path winding down a steep descent
From the long-bladed grasslands
Into the dense, wiry scrub of the beach headlands.

The sound of the crashing shore below beckons.
The dark emerald Ocean of Dreaming glistens,
Starlight shimmering upon its surface,
White-crowned waves roll through the darkness
Before breaking upon powdery sands.

At journey’s end, the winding path delivers
The sleepwalker to the glistening beach,
Where grains of sand sparkle like diamonds
Beneath the pale moonlight.

There they sit, empty-eyed and motionless,
Gazing out across the sea.

Waiting. Summoning. The Ship of Fools.

A captainless vessel,
Crewed by the mad and dysfunctional,
Lost souls adrift upon memory and desire,
Blindly navigating the dreamlands.

Far beyond the breakers,
A lantern flickers.
Then another.
Then another.

Ghostly lights dancing upon the horizon.
The sleepwalker rises.

For tonight, the ship seems closer.

Its shadowed hull emerges from the darkness,
Ancient sails hanging motionless,
Black against the stars.

No voices call from the deck.
No welcome is offered.

Yet still they walk forward.

The cold surf washes over their feet,
Then their knees,
Then their waist.

With every step the vessel drifts farther away,
Always beyond reach,
Always waiting,
Always calling.

Beneath the moon, the emerald waters glow.
Their depths churn with silent movement,
Dark shapes turning far below.

Still the sleepwalker follows,
Believing the next step will bring them aboard,
Believing the next wave will carry them to the ship.

Believing. Believing.

Until the sea closes over their head.
The lanterns vanish.
The ship dissolves into mist.

And far away, beneath the waking sun,
A body washes ashore upon an empty beach.

While somewhere beyond the veil of dreaming,
Another pale figure wanders the shoreline,
Waiting beside the Ocean of Dreams,
For the Ship of Fools.

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Newton’s Cradle

My mind is finally being nourished creatively,
Like a Newton’s cradle in motion, I have momentum,
Ideas collide,
A hundred thoughts suddenly fighting for sunlight.

I feel as though I have lingered too long in darkness,
A creative solitary confinement of fatigue,
Working beneath soul-sapping monotony,
The stress of day work loosening its chokehold.

Slowly, surely,
My imagination returns.
I can write, I can create,
I can rebuild the architecture of my mind.

The weight, the weight,
That heavy crushing upon my thoughts,
Has begun to lessen.
That sickly hunger for content, content, content,
Is subsiding.

It feels as though the tide is withdrawing,
Allowing the sands of creativity to breathe.
I know the tide shall return,
But for the first time in a long while,
I will have taken a breath.

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Chaos Structure

I keep each day much like the previous,
The same beginning, the same middle, the same end.
There is comfort in routine;
It grants me time to imagine, to create, to live.

My mind thrives upon structure,
Upon order.
In knowing, there is control.

Otherwise…
Chaos.

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Unwelcome Arrival

Weary, resting in velvet armchair comfort,
I close my eyes; inhale deeply, then exhale,
Inviting myself to believe the lie that I am calm.

I feel the serpent writhing in my gut,
Grimvael,
Slithering upward around my spine,
Briefly constricting my throat,
Before coiling within my mind.

His unwelcome arrival announced,
I feel his icy black tendrils,
Reaching deep into my most wounded memories,
Feeding, feeding,
Drinking his fill from my hidden sorrows,
One thousand memories fastened to one thousand suckers.

The great serpent stirs forgotten places,
Twisting, twisting,
Until sleep claims me.

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Canal Boat

Once every month the black boat comes,
When mist unthreads the sleeping quay,
No footsteps sound, no lantern burns,
No living soul its course can see.

It creaks against the lonely dock,
Old timber groaning soft with age,
And waits exactly seven minutes,
Silent as grief, still as a page.

No ferryman stands at the helm,
No hand is seen to steer or guide,
Yet something stirs upon the boards,
What unseen phantoms step inside?

A ferry for forgotten dead?
For names the river could not keep?
Who is the captain none behold,
Who sails between our waking sleep?

And when it slips back into mist,
No witness marks the path it chose,
If none have seen it truly come,
Did it exist, or a dream of ghosts?