Heat Death
Three o'clock The city fog descends upon The neighbourhood Looking from the balcony One cannot see down shrouded streets Past two blocks.
No stars above in endless black The streetside trees stretch forth their boughs To grasp and claw at nothingness Nought to see except what lies below The concrete track There alone to see Its every asphalt groove and mound Thrown in stark relief By lamplight that discovers Neither road ahead, nor sky on high But shutters both, and draws the gaze down.
Amidst the fog, one cannot glimpse The human faces of the neighbours The man at his piano, the girl immersed in books The child with its building bricks Assembling worlds, starfish hands curled in determined fists Isolate, disparate, forsaken, in schism Within the abysm of the mist.
Between the heat and cold there is the fog Human warmth spread increasing thin A host of embers scattered to the wind Losing heat without a core Where was the hearth, cold grey ashes Lifeless dust about the floor Separation, slow dispersion Of tiny points of light ever growing dim Approaching the ultimate inertion And weak to stand against the encroaching chill of night: Entropic end.
Only the concrete can one see Ten steps ahead perhaps, no more Heads bowed down to trace the immediate path In the aging walk paved by slow machines To count the cracks, avoid the crevices Never lift their sights to meet the solemn, lidless stare Of an everpresent cloud of witnesses.
If I came with songs and poems of old to clear the haze Would you hear the words I spoke to you? And should you feed thereon with faith and thanksgiving? No, my people, you should turn your face away For what are the words of the poets and prophets? Who can discern them? And who is willing? Bound in chains of darkness, we eke out feeble lives Tired roles we endlessly reprise Drinking, laughing, never seeing face to face Divided, we are swiftly conquered And the voice that crieth in the wilderness Is as utterly alone as all the rest.
But the Word of the Lord came to me in a roundabout way
And as I stand upon the stage
To call upon that ancient Muse
I see your faces unconfused
Behold the book which bound am I to impart
The scroll inscribed upon a consecrated heart
Comfort ye my people, saith your God
For between the cold and heat there is the fog.
The everpresent cloud of smoke, the mist Which rises fragrant from the coals, thrice-blest Eclipsing faces 'midst the glowing light Stand aright! Our souls are spread increasing thin A breath, a whisper upon the wind The Lord possessed me at the beginning of his work By me hath he renewed the earth Remember, O Man, that dust thou art A dying ember upon the hearth Separation, slow dispersion A flickering light grows ever dim Approaching the ultimate inertion And weak to stand as night encroaches on the world's o'erflowing brim: O Elohim, the end, the end Wisdom! Let us attend.
