Are there those who speak of the triumph of life?

And has it been, here below, that any would oblige

What perilous thorns cut years of Hearts, and Strife,

Before love could kiss what warmth could arrive?

 

Streets as these, and times like a sickly Bottle,

Whose walking death, alive, with alcohol spills,

tears neatly apart what dreams, of children coddled,

would otherwise flower, and think to be born: a thrill!

 

Instead dreary, and dragging, saliva here calls

as it runs down the neck, off a drunken breach

of tight skin and black soul, long struck with daily falls

for whom madmen cry, while for death, they beseech!

 

Ever clear, once the number, of times he had smiled

Now, ever old, with a mind who jumps years

when even flesh remains young, in thoughts broken, defiled

He seizes the pillow, and squeezes in fear!

 

What loss of touch, and hint of a bludgeon

swings, without miss, as in London’s Tower

where all interactions, in a social dungeon,

were everywhere here, stampeding such Flowers

would otherwise rise, if first, compunction

would steal all hearts, to love sweet Hours,

where true, without rue, a recluse assumption

would wither away, and lose its Power.

 

But signs, there are not, that these recluse cries

will ever here end, nor diminish in truth,

since men, all, in our time sow demise,

in apathy firm, and pure gain, uncouth!

 

These are the wails: that childrens’ limbs

Fly, as they do, from warfare devils,

and this only sings, what invisible, lives

in daily, peaceable drivel, in which civilization revels!

 

This is the manner, how walking death dreams,

like a nightmare, unfolded, yet crushed ‘neathe the seams

of a Paradox Cloth, in which sickness gleams

like an angel of light, which unlike Satan, seems

to kiss man’s forays, and soothe life’s trees,

from horror, affliction, and sordid disease

but in fact, teethes, with mouths ready to bleed

with vampire will, and wildebeest speed!

Ah! Look what we’ve got: after all, Satan indeed!

 

Such is the manner, of even things this modern,

when the shallows of men define endless seas,

while self-congratulating, eschew things somber,

but nonetheless cause them, through negligent means!

 

Sever, then, we must, every pretension,

and never again lust, for what dreams may come!

For now is the moment, when ends declension,

if only delusion would tuck tail, and run!

 

But not, I know well, what man will compel

Maybe, a splinter, will that moment whisper,

as mere, laughable, such hairs of wood swell

like a wave, not giant, but of a beach’s slow glimmer!

 

For not, any truth, will these times know

But to revel in self, and make terror boats row

 

 

Would that it be:

 

that love had a chance!

 

 

But it chose, instead, knives!

 

How tragic, these hearts,

 

with bloody, still terror, against whom contrives,

 

this life, torn in parts,

 

while devils divide!

 

 

What tenderness imparts,

 

now dies in sweet cushions:

 

where once, kindly Art

 

rested, soft, in

 

Sweet

 

Illusions.

 

 

_________________

 

R.V. Smith: “Walking Death”, 07-17-25

 

© 2025 by Ryan Vincent Smith