The night outside feels so loud in its silence,
I listen wearily, retracing old faces in my mind,
Ghosts of laughter echo through hollow corridors,
Their voices worn thin by the passage of time,
Each memory arrives like a hesitant visitor,
Knocking softly where sleep once stood guard,
And I sit beneath the weight of their shadows,
Counting the distance between what was and what remains.
Knight of Sorrow
A sullen knight battles the grisly spectre of death,
Armour and silvered sword shine in desperate combat,
Death’s cape of plague and sorrow flows in the icy breeze,
The scythe of reaping clutched within hands of cold bone,
The brave knight battles through sunlight and starshine,
But death is always one step ahead, cunning and sure,
At the knight’s feet, ebony serpents rise from the earth,
Beasts of childhood dreams encircle and entangle feet,
Fangs bared and biting they savage the knight,
Death adders with scales of shining blackened silk,
Invade the knight through necrotic flesh, burrowing,
Coiling within his gut to create a liquifying den of snakes,
Death claims his prize and the fallen knight is laid waste,
A once brave soul, left to putrefy within his armoured shell.
Thought Serpent
Shadows dance by lamplight inviting intrusive thoughts,
Although the hour is late, I must address their demands,
I sit and write, hoping to dismantle their covert weaponry,
Those heavy thoughts behind my eyes like invaders in my keep,
Anxieties that hang in the air like thick scales upon the back,
Of that great black serpent that has weaved its path,
Throughout the entirety of my waken memory,
Sleep may conquer it, but the realm of dreams must wait,
Until I write, then reword, and contemplate my escape,
Time passes, my mind aches and my eyes begin to burn,
I’m weary enough now to swallow that evening pill,
Knowing, that the great serpent sits coiled within me still.
That which slumbers now awakens
The coal-stained silver lined clouds rumble,
Restlessly churning above a black range,
A symphony accompanied by the caw of crows,
Cemetery stones jut through mist like broken teeth,
Marking the empty husks of men and kin cowering within graves,
Screaming tree hollows drum with the sound of steady rain,
As the dried lungs of empty creek-beds breathe once more,
An intense feeling of static electricity fills the air,
As bright cobwebs of lightning flicker across the sky,
A heavy hum vibrates deep within the bowels of the land,
Something that once slumbered has awakened,
Stirring, timeless and immense with insatiable hunger,
A leviathan no longer content to remain darkly dreaming,
Once secreted away within the ocean realm of sleep,
This ancient is of the stars, of the land and sea,
A shapeless colourless world devouring entity.
Doom Absolute
I had a dream…
There is a hidden fracture in the world,
A gaping wound leaking black emptiness,
Where the infinite darkness of the void seeps in,
Slowly choking all light and love,
Soon, a great plague of sorrow will cover the land,
From raging sea to distant mountain,
Blacking out the earth into a deathly silence,
Doom.
Adrift Within
At times, my mind feels adrift at sea,
Lost, with no stars left to guide me,
Disconnected, suspended between directions,
Where every horizon holds the same bleak view.
So where do I turn to now,
When true north feels unattainable,
When my thoughts circle like currents,
Pulling me between fear, grief, and exhaustion.
Do I follow the fading light,
or sink beneath the weight of the storm?
Do I keep calling into the dark?
In the hope that something calls back.
The ocean within feels vast and unnavigable,
I drift, emotionally disorientated and restless,
I lack clarity or trust in what may come next,
Struggling to find something solid to aim for.
Perhaps the question is not “Where do I go?”,
But,“What part of me can I anchor to”,
A place where I can take a breath and refocus,
Where I can hold my head above these crushing waves.
In the Company of Wolves
Under full moon ten wolves came skulking,
With silent step and black fur hulking,
To infiltrate a village sleeping,
For its children they came reaping.
Some were devoured and two brothers were taken,
Back to their den where they’d awaken,
And feed upon the savage teat,
Of mother made of fang and padded feet.
Hidden beneath an old dead tree they wallow,
Nurtured beasts in a cave-like hollow,
Growing with time into wolf-like men,
Worse than wolves, when they left that den.
In the deepest forest where a cottage hides,
The brothers killed two men but spared their brides,
They claimed this den and the women within,
To make them their own and breed their kin.
News reached the castle from across the land,
A tale of wolf-men and their carnivorous clan,
The King was disturbed by this horrific event,
And to the shadowed wood his finest were sent.
With silvered blades and torches bright,
Six brave knights rode through the night,
Through twisted briar and raven’s cry,
Beneath the pale and watchful sky.
They found the cottage black with dread,
Its doorway stained a sullen red,
Where the brothers rose with a sinister grin,
Human without but beast within.
When dawn at last embraced the glen,
No howl remained of wolfish men,
The women freed from fear and grief,
Were led to warmth and sweet relief.
So ends the tale the old tongues tell,
Of wolves that dragged two boys to hell,
And knights who rode where nightmares tread,
To keep the living from joining the dead.
In this moment
Warm is the golden sun that rises,
Over eucalyptus and cypress shadow,
Across night frosted lawns beginning to melt,
After the long night, a new day is born,
There is a cool sharpness to the air,
A calm silence throughout the home,
Where I sit, eyes closed but seeing.
A brief glow of sunlight shines through glass,
It feels like a kindness, gently warming my face,
Every time feels like the first.
In this moment my mind feels free,
I can forget the sadness of the past,
And the fear of what the future will bring,
In this moment I’m caught,
Spellbound and suspended,
Within a rapturous embrace of warmth.
In this moment everything is ok,
And I am enough.
Welcome to nowhere
For some, it becomes harder to let the light in,
The world seems full of ghosts,
Every face seen is a blur,
Every name known is forgotten,
A darkness consumes the world,
The only certainty is that scratching,
Behind an old wooden door,
That colourless place with stale icy air,
Where death resides.
Masks
There is a point that we reach,
When the daily mask we wear,
No longer fits our life,
So, we remove and dispose of it,
Leaving the flesh beneath raw and pliable,
In the beginning, it is sensitive to all sensation,
Eventually it will harden into a new mask,
Life exists in a state of constant flux,
Hopefully a time will eventually come,
When no masks are required,
The way we interact with the world will change,
And we can finally rest and be free.
Dan Verkys 