Wednesday 2 April 2008

Poem in a time of cholera and contradiction


Burn them,
Burn them all.

Burn the fairytale endings and the moonlit nights,
Burn the heart shaped carvings on the old oak trees,
Burn the kisses off the young lips,
and the skin off the hands that caress.

Burn them.
Burn them all.

Burn the books that tell of eyes that sparkle
and hearts that warm.
Burn the Neruda poems, burn the Sonnets.
Burn the tales of Lost Lenore.

Find the lovers, find the Romeos,
Build walls to keep them in,
and set fire to the kindling underneath them all.

Burn the tears of joy and the echoes of laughter,
Bottle them up in a jar,
and toss it to the floor.

Burn them.
Burn them all.

Tear the sheets from the beds, and the pages from the books,
Cry treason, treason, treason, till you can no more.

Let it all burn to the ground,
Throw ash and smoke to the heavens,
In flames that burn hotter and wilder
than both Joan and Fawkes could endure.

Burn them.
Burn them all.

No redemption here
No mercy, no more.
Burn it all.

Burn it all,
And toss into the fire your soul...

Because without them,
What is there to exist for?

No comments: