Stained Purity

Artwork by Ryu Eun Hye

A heavy darkness, is draped, and framed around her sullied grief,

For she never thought of his heft, until the severed head

Of her dear father, stoutly rested upon her hollow chest

While she intently stared, through the heavy curtain of the night,

Into his pale blue lifeless eyes, that almost seemed, to reciprocate,

Was just her eyes, reflected back in the frigid shallow depths

Of her king, whom she once revered, with a kingdom, that despised his rule,

A lost empire, they walk blindly, towards the brim of the cuff,

As the stains of treachery, seep deeply, into the fibers,

Pain, trapped in the talons of deception, running rampid

In the grand castle, housing death, of those fallen to the shrouded blade,

It was the world in despair, perched, upon the young girl’s shoulders

As she softly asks, “Why?”, waiting for those cold lips to part, and answer,

But the eerie dead silence, weighs heavier, than the rotting disjoin,

How could she knock on the gates of sanity, expecting sincerity

When all it does, is ignore the plea of the lost, and of the broken,

But does that mean, the axis you’re buried in, has to be your grave?

A question, she struggled with, as she gently placed her father to rest

Upon the stained royal threading, like the one, sunken into the ground,

She vacated her bed, and approached, her blurred reflection,

Only, there was something else, peering back through the looking glass,

As she crept in close, she found a tight huddle of decapitation,

Painted, onto the folds, in rigid strokes that blended its unsightly disorder,

Which pierced the veil, straight into the heart of her innocence,

She questioned their appearance, searching her deprivation

For clues to clarity, knowing, their presence was the real query,

But her concern, was their striking anger, pervading desolation,

Nothing, but the whispers in her ear, from voices long snuffed

Out of existence, to be resurrected, in her hour of torment,

A glaring stain, that’s all it was, she repeated back, drowning the voices

Suddenly surrounding her, enveloped by their breath,

A rising fog in her narrowing canal, leading her back to the surface,

“Your hands!” – the voices repeated, like a skipping record

Echoing off each other’s final syllable, heard eternally

In her mind, as her fading grip on the tangible, loses the edge,

While these voices, coming from a mirage of floating deceased familiars,

Continued their repetitive chant, and feeling those words vigorously rattle

Against her chest, drowning her, in the avalanche of their onslaught,

Still hearing it’s chime, as it shakes off the rust, a ghost from her past

And a rising chill, that slices through, as time stands still

Atop the broken pendulum, forgotten about amongst the rubble,

Hooked, into her consciousness, as it slithered through her senses

Leaving behind a grave remembrance, like a figure in ragged cloth

Slowly scraping its scythe, along the conscious dread,

She felt it’s jarring slither, invading her temple, tightening it’s grasp,

As she ripped herself out, from the inside, and examined the parasite,

It’s familiar villainous glare, captured, her bewildered attention

And dragged it, with its thorny tentacles, tattering along her entrails,

Purging this alien being, examining it in a stunned silence

As she becomes consumed by this evil, stretching out, spilling

Onto her crumbling perception of her own sanity,

Who were these gruesome faces, glaring, at the poor girl, losing her religion,

Starting her monologue in order to rationalize her madness,

Trying to convince herself, that it was only a haunting mirage,

But then she noticed her cage, was slowly shrinking, tightening its choke

Around the absolute, leaving her gasping and frozen, in it’s imprint,

Grasping her head, as if it was the only way, to keep it attached,

Closing her eyes, feeling for tranquility, to which has dissipated,

Leaving her stranded, alone, in the complexity of this moment,

As “Your hands!” again, reaches out from the infinite darkness

Of her own chambers, where these faces, have found birth,

Or have they been stationary, from before the dawn of her time,

Only now, breaking silence, as they catch her terror-filled attention,

Dragging her sight back towards the perched dominion,

Pulling her in, staggered over, planted back on her stained damask,

And strayed her sight, to what she hoped, was a horrific illusion,

Tucked up into the bedstead, as watchful eyes follow, meeting her gaze,

Piercing her shaken soul with their watchful daggers,

Then, in unison, they speak… “Your hands, carried our words

Lost eternally, in the tears crashing down, for we are known!”

Feeling, the wakening cracks of her dessert tongue

As she forces speech, wide eyed and dismayed,

“Known… by who? What is the reason for this horrifying presence?”

“Your hands carries our weight, our debt, in the blood you spilled.”

Those last words, chimed around in her sunken skull,

The horror still perceived, within her bewilderment,

“Who’s blood?!”… was she already bathing in it, taken from the guillotine,

As she crashed against stone, constructed in her own clouded mind,

Stopping her from cognizance, dormant, upon her padded frame,

As she was afraid to lose her grip, upon the shadow that she cast,

For she did recognize the gazing, frightening huddle,

She bolted herself onto her likeness, speaking to her past, suffocated

Under the anchor she drew upon herself, forced deeper

Into the shadow of her virtue, until the moment it had shattered,

For her empire, collapsed, under the weight of treachery,

Losing sight of anything further, past the point of her father’s doom,

Suddenly the room spun Her around, as the ragged cloth approached

With a dusty veil, draped from its crown, scrapping a scythe of bone

Beyond the deep of its narrow cave, toward her illumination,

And it’s true reveal, slowly pulling back, shedding the darkness,

Divulging, the unkempt veil of matted, and tangled hair

That seemed to blend, into the stained ragged cloth it wore

As it continued to replace, the space between them, groaning,

And dragging its skeletal foot, beyond, onto the foreground of her disbelief,

There, amongst the spinning silence that entwined their convergence,

Was the distant shadow, now in front of her, a glaring reflection,

As her insanity grew from the heart, it was awakened, by her mind,

A sinuous mound in the collapse, down to her frail knees,

Suddenly, the little girl, was a fallen angel, amongst the bones of time,

Her own moment, calcified, while being buried alive, within insanity,

“I know the gruesome expressions on the faces, peering through the shallow’s deep.”

Awoken, by the beast of her own hollowed out incarceration,

She was never far, from its breath, heavy upon her nape

And reminded constantly, of the head she had torn off, by sharp steel,

In order to save an empire, that fell, along with their queen,

But even though she had retired the beast, it tends to rise, eventually.

51422 D. Poe

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The People in the Walls

Artwork by Anton Semenov

In this house, the walls, whisper to each other,

Heard by only one occupant, as she shivers, under her covers

Hoping to stay shrouded, in the softness of her bed,

From the groning, snaking underneath, and then into her closet,

Where in the depth, of the shadows, are these frightners,

Stalking, this young girl’s every move, unsafe in her own home

As these stains upon the walls, covered by paint, peek through,

For the faces behind the masking, peer, with their gaping eyes

At the terrified child, pressing her doll closer to her chest

Calling out, “Mom! Dad!”, waiting for the light, to engulf the dark,

But countless sleep deprived nights, sharing bright fairytales

Trying to subdue her tremors, assuring her, there are no monsters,

Has rendered her parents, comatose, in the shudder of their girl,

As she finds shadows, clutching at her bed sheets,

Slowly dragging off her cloak, exposing her to the terror,

Scratching, through her walls, oozing into the girl’s vulnerability,

Her whimpering, intensifies, choking at her inability to cry out,

Caught in a paralysis, from the nearing slither

Until, the sudden cut of light, illuminates the inanimate,

Her closet, occupied by only her toys, clothes and trinkets,

Under her bed, dust bunnies, spread through the entire stretch,

And no reach of shadow, cast from the bare tree out her window,

But along the walls, the faint imprints, of those same faces

Haven’t vanished, into the swallow, of the fluorescent abyss,

Instead, to the girl’s fright, they were more distinct,

Staying within her sight, no longer lurking, within the shadows,

They grew, transforming every inch of plaster, into ghosts of the hollow,

For they’ve become the walls, of her ominous entrapment

As she buried her face, into her parent’s exhausted embrace,

But she couldn’t stay there, as she tried to play, ignoring

What was there, on her walls, staring, absorbing her innocence,

There before her, at every moment, no rest for the haunted,

She’d gone down, to have breakfast, and suddenly froze,

For they were following her, now throughout the entire house,

She turned, covered her eyes, but did not call for her parents,

Her lips slowly parted to speak, but only a slight gasp emerged

Before she spoke, and started to plead, with her imagined stalkers,

Speaking to the demons in her mind, to vanish back, behind the paint,

It wasn’t until the family dog, angrily barked, at the wall of ghosts

That the little girl knew, she wasn’t imagining this terror,

These faces, tightly tethered to this house, illuminate for her,

She simply asked the hollow wall, why, as it echoed in her mind,

Hearing herself, in a different voice, which wasn’t her own,

She’d spoken directly to them, as they used her consciousness, to answer,

“I am the first of the hollowed ones, cursed, to this linear cage,

For fear of the outside, had shackled me to these walls

To which I cannot separate from, for we are one entity,

Soon, more like me arrived, where fear had overtaken

As it did within me, and I knew, I was to save them all,

I had drained them of their debilitating fright

And given them life, to which I thought was punishment,

These walls, keep us in that embrace, that you chase,

Then we used fear, emptied and primed you, for this eternity,

And like you, we were all afraid, but no longer in dread,

As you are now, part of the hollow ones, fear, has vanished.”

And suddenly, she was gone, and the dog stopped barking,

Her parents, through grief, separated from remembrances,

Left the house, that had no answers around the disappearance,

As another family arrives, and a fresh coat of paint is applied.

Visited

I lay my head down, eager to drift into a somber huddle,

But I feel an outstretched, bleak reach invading

My chest, sunken in, cracking the cage around the castle,

As silence stands, defenseless against the owl’s screech

I shut my eyes, and try to halt the vigorous spinning

Inside my head, as flashes of probability, is projected

Onto the backs of my eyelids, who is this visiting,

A touch, familiar, enlarges the drumbeat’s echo,

While I can’t distinguish, this perplexing occurrence,

I know it’s desire, its prelude to the awaited for cessation,

An evident resident, in the eerie hours of unrest,

How many nights, does this being visit my side of the bed

To watch me tremble, knowing of its ominous presence,

Even then, I have sleep paralysis from an absent dread

That surfaces, from its deep growl, and slowly ascends

Over me, gaining a glimpse, into my palpable panic,

Rapid, boisterous breathing and a feverish sweat,

Happens within a tick of an old, dried up clock,

Forgotten to be wound up, and given a entryway

For those that time, gives no pardon.

Come Back

The reality of death, is the stalking feeling

You get, the little hairs stand at attention,

And you freeze inside, vanish into the distance,

But somehow, you’ve come back, you haunt,

A ghost story, perched upon its past, what it misses,

Eager to feel it against its bust, to sync with the heart

That gave you a louder drum, which has failed,

Torn and rusted over, but you persist,

Getting louder, squawking until it all shatters,

Yet no one notices, and you refuse to abandon

Your post, ignoring the flaws that tarnished

Your feathers, streamed down, from your black eyes,

You’ve come back, but your ghost is a withered memory.

Returning

They’ve returned, after the annihilation 

To find their home, beyond recognition 

From the burning winds, sinking all they knew

Into the deserted light, reflecting in their suits

Without penetrating their conceived safety, 

Surveying all that decayed beneath their feet

They hear withered screams floating off 

In with the rest of the wondering debris, 

The land lies barren, empty of what once was, 

Returned in pursuit for all that they’ve lost

Discovering their possessions belong now 

To this alien world, infused with its desolation, 

Buried in disaster, gore in rubles of memory, 

All that they can recall is the blast, aftermath 

Is all that remains, and whirlwinds beside them

Showing distance inbetween the rolling storms,

A vast forgotten scape that they must uncover

To find any shred, of what they left behind,

They move past the shrieking cover, probing 

Further into the erosion, 

Further out from their way back, 

Crunching other relinquished items of past 

Under their steps, stumbling upon a block 

Compressed, of ancient times and possessions, 

Sitting beside a heated watery grave, occupied 

By one, preserved by the past breaking off

From the boulder and dripping in, 

They approached the pool, staring 

At the floating coarpse swimming on its belly, 

One of them started toward the shallow pit

Reaching out, finger tips barely grazing 

The slightly decomposed arm, yet able to hook

And reel it in for inspection, and found himself,

His black eyes staring into the empty oculus

Of the known drifter, shuddering his spine,

“Is the face gone beyond recognition? ”

Says the other, walking to rippling puddle, 

“No, it is mine, clearly.” while capturing 

His own snapshot, “now we look for yours.”

He draws out a blaze, and flicks it,

Disintegrating the very last, of his own remains, 

They walk onwards, combing the not so distant earth,

Ensuring, no other could depict existence. 

©DorianPoe2016

A Fly on the Wall

Riddles infest my burdened, insomniatic mind
Watching, the fly upon my wall, how bored
It must be, peering down at a dented bed,
Then wondering, why not find a more appealing scene,
Am I that entertaining, swimming in misery
Of the mocking tick coming from my bedside clock,
There goes another hour, debating the shit eater,
And just like previous night’s, I’m consumed
By the deep labyrinths that I, trapped myself in,
Until, there came a knock upon my door,
Not the front, but my chamber door,
Despite its haunting peculiarality, I opened it
Finding only an empty hallway, dark and cold,
Silence echoes through, this eerie vacant hall
With my heavy breath fogging my surroundings,
Chilled whispers reach out for me from behind,
I back in, to my chamber seeking for what has crept
Through my gates, and into my unrest,
I feel my entire body, tense up from a horrid chill
Pulsing me up against the far wall,
And then, it appeared to me, in the mist of my breath,
My floating demon, keeping me from dreamscape,
Jumped, into my chaos within, amplifying it,
Until I imploded, forever asleep.

What is normal to the fly,
Is chaos for the spider.

©DorianPoe 2015

The Hunter and it’s Prey

An abrasive squawk, barges in
To a tightly grasped serenity,
Always distant,
Running into the depths, from it’s
Predator mocking a chilled turmoil
Is I, as I hide in the mid summer’s
Night garden, from the dwelling beast,
Sniffing out, my dread,
Where is my resting scape,
As a vanishing point, loses sight
In the crushing waters
Swallowing, the unattainable light,
Silence in this wrestle,
As I plot my stiff, weary bones
Beside these huddled stones, upright,
Tall, as they seclude my pant,
But for how long,
How much of the sand wastes away
Before my hunter, catches wind,
How will I know,
Will it be when cold fire seizes
My heart, in the howling echo
Of the collapsed pendulum,
As the vacant chime, of a halted world
Shines just enough light,
Upon me,
Found in muddled fright,
How long will I do this, hiding
From the stalking truth
That I, am a stranger
Amongst the living,
So I rise arms open as swift wings
Of my scrounger approaches
And carries me away,
Into the ambit.

©DorianPoe 2015

Glimpse of What Vanished

The diligence of him carried the world by,
For all he wanted, was to find her light
Hidden, in the darkest recesses of emptiness,
She was still, laying in the dining water
As every sail, went on beside the fear,
The guide bringing them, blocking
Thought in the paralysis of beat,
He stood there, amongst the daring
With fire glaring at his fainting strength,
By the pinch of sight into the beyond
He captures her, in the waning window
Of revival, for she seems further away
Every moment he can’t see her,
He jumps in, falling faster down the singed
Path, eclipsing his decent was the dark
Of the plateau he ascended from,
He crashed to the above originating
Below where he poured night
Into the delusions perched on the table,
Realizing, his glass is empty again,
She’s gone, faded into the whispered wings,
As he gets up, puts foot into grass
And walks up to her grave,
Staring, looking for a glimpse
Of her, to capture.

©DorianPoe 2015