The Woods

Into the wood I went

Into the dark impending darkness, desolate, dissolved

A thousand scattered diamonds, across the floor

A thousand unanswered questions, thrown down

Melting off branches in the wind, in autumn funeral

In petals of thought in peals of wood

Into the wood I went, stepping from path to path

From stream to stream to trodden grass

Twelve o'clock the bells contract

And birds swim across the thinning mist

Skies dark, above swaying trees, unseen in the dusk that has fallen

Down here.

Alice fell down and down

The tumbling maze, the turning tracks

The holes in which shoes will roll

She landed solely on her feet, upon a checkered square

In the wood she came, into the wood she left

But the wood will never leave her mind

When she fell so from the path

She waved goodbye, shone on through thickening thickets

And sank into the dank earth, the salty earth of the wood

The foot sinking into the puddle, a child playing in mud

The mother angry, plucks her out

But she has no mother, and the foot no body

And so she sinks, after twelve, for now it is twelve fifteen

And soon awakes the dead

Displacing her grace, rising in thick smoky columns, lumbering

Through forest deep, along the path, on which they once walked

Looking for Alice, in the closing hole

Of the rabbit

I wandered lightly through now, barely touching the ground

Tripping slightly, barely making a sound.

Between the stalks, egg white flesh leaps expectantly

Expecting a welcome, clawing leaves, shredding grasses with

Their feet. Becoming bolder as she has gone

And left them to run. In the wood

Nobody can hear their screams, now they don't exist.

So they reach towards me

As I run through the wood.

To love was to become solitary

A rich velvet curtain, pulled, across the bed

Dirty grey light drifts in clumps, writhing limbs in tangled

Swollen lips, sealed shut, unyielding

Throaty singing, black lines race up to meet salty corners

Red silk sways, sway

Adorer c'est être solitaire, mais vous êtes pas dans la forêt

You are in the wood of another, in racing fields

By racing streams, criss crossing meadows, feet bare, legs lean

Curtain falling, falling, down

Singing, singing, softly drowned

Writhing limbs shuddering to a distant drum, echoing past

Trees, twisted in place, tortured, swollen like the lips

Of the singers

Si tu veux un amour durable; être préparé pour la pluie

Droplets will scatter, a myriad of fallen stars at your feet

Unless you piece together, un coeur brisé

Alors vous verrez la pluie comme les étoiles dans le ciel

Unlasting love

Fog bred fast, through the wood

Love bled last, in the wood

Till all left felled was grass

And wispy smoke

Burning ashes blow around, bones buried under ground

Hands reaching never meeting, over newly blackened land

Sing on great singers of ages past

Sing through the cold, black inky night

And wake tomorrow in tumbled sheets, with strangers rocking

By fire grates, to stave off the ever welcoming dream

Where ashes dance, and bone filled earth crumbles near

Blistered feet.

Adorer c'est être solitaire

Comme les étoiles dans le ciel

And after the ball, there was silence

All around, and the trays were carried out

Chairs folded away into hidden closets

Half eaten meats returned themselves to the pantry

And then there was silence.

At the end, of the dining room, large

Wooden stakes sit, high and regal, with souls

Speared on each point, they shiver, and squirm

But resist resisting, in the cold hall that had once

Bustled warm in the winter ball

The serving girl cleared away the last of the dishes

Then approached the long alter, to pardon the souls, caught

On the bridge between worlds, but in nearing

She aged, until wrinkled frowns crossed her brow and she

Stooped to the floor, aching knuckles sore

She finally arrived at the sterile plateau, and kissed each

Forehead in turn, dry lips cracked gently brushed

And stepping back down the hall, her nails grew strong

Hair grew long, creases filling, spine unwinding

The serving girl continues her business, fog fogging her thoughts

Now quickly receding

Her minute of fear sinking back down, seeping into the barren land

Meeting the ashes of the bones, buried further down

Eyes embedded, closed throats strangled, lost in the washes

Of her mind, whisked away in darkened recesses

The souls are forgotten, and the ball holds her memories transfixed

The lights and laughter, food and passion, dirty curtains pulled across

Secret moments, flowing wells of ruby wine, and burnt out hearts

That know not how to see the barren death around

They talk and whimper in hushed soft tones

While the deadly mist pulls all who eat at the sordid banquet

Into the crypt of mortal imprisonment, until all the world

Is fast asleep.

Rich heady smells rose to each cracked skull

Turning towards the ground, they breathed

Filling themselves with ancient musky dirt

That cloaked their vision of passers by

And darkened trees rose up against the sky

And whip their branches down skeletal backs

Drawing droplets of blood from their stoney spines

That trickle and fall

On disquieted earth.

Till the earth stops crying and the men stop dying

And the dead stop bleeding and falling and lying

On twisted roots of troubled pasts

And the trees stop whipping the tortured souls

That labour on

In the wood.

Convulsed. They convulsed, with muted cries

That fell on deafened ears, racking they convulsed

Till groaning, new souls were birthed into the harsh light

And the leaves nestled round to protect them

From the wailing, chalky dead still listening

Ever listening, for the footsteps that fall into the soil

For a traveller wayward walking, into the shadows

Into the trees, into the wood.