The Authority Of Truth

TRUTH
Is the only
Authority

To bow
for anything
else
Is to fall
on one's knees
in cowardly
defeat

To obey
TRUTH
Is to lead
Your Life
in ITS
direction

TRUTH
does not demand
you demean your self
and crawl

TRUTH
Commands
Those that walk upright
not to slouch
or slack
in their strides
but to continue
Ever Forward
Toward reaching
The Authority
Of Truth

Without Idols or Alters...

An alter
  alternative
Or another
  affectation
Or absent
  allegation

Empty monuments
  with no gawds
Within them
 hollowed hearts
  pouring out
and trying to void
  their voids

Negate the negative
Subjugate the subject
Objectify the object
Disclaim the disclaimers

What's there
  but can't be seen
Or can
  but none to clearly
What's missing
  or not quite found
Or long since gone
  and underground

 The Unknown
  implied
  denied
  assumed
Idols & Alters
  To What?
  For What?
  Or Not?

Without Idols or Alters
  what would there be?
Beyond Idols & Alters
  what
truth
morality
ideology
faith
...
  Would there
  Could there
be?

With no Symbol
 of the Ideal
how could such
 unknown abstractions
be treated as
  Real?

Without Idols or Alters
  what sacrifice
would be made?
To what?
For whom?
And Why?

Without Idols or Alters
  Could man become more
than beastly beliefs
or deviant disbeliefs

Without Idols or Alters
  Could Truth
    Remain,
    Be Found,
    Or Released?

Without idols or alters
  what idle alterations
might there be
to triumph or falter
or simply just concede?

The Alchemist's Tea...

  I watched as he melted the ice in the microwave. My perplexed face prompted him to provide some explanation for this oddity. As he filled another small container with ice from his cooler to be melted, his proud voice explained.
  "The water I get from the tap aint no good at home. I cant afford no bottled water neither. So I take whats left in my cooler, and melt it 'fore I split. That way I can pour it into my jugs to take home."
  He could have stopped right there. If he had I might have dismissed him as being a bit ridiculous & cheap. Instead, he went on with his explanation.
  "When I do get home, I'll freeze the water from my jugs so I can have ice.  I can melt the ice again if I want some ice-water or ice-tea. I like my drinks to be ice-cold. I drink a lot of water and tea too. I probably go through a few gallons every day."
  It seemed as if the thinking parts of him had been melted down along with all the ice he'd melted over his 40-some-odd years of working here. Now the thirst for validation flowed from his proud/vacant expression. I couldn't do anything in response to his approval-seeking stare, but offer some pre-forgotten/lukewarm reply.
  The Alchemist continued to turn ice into water, water into ice, &c. He couldn't seem to apply this mastery of conversion to anything else. He couldn't thaw himself from his frozen state, or freeze the ever flowing tears that he didn't know well enough to cry. All he could do was perpetuate the conversions of freezing and flow, as he guzzled it all down in the Alchemist's Tea.

As I Look Away...

See the faces
  not of flesh
  but figures
Staring at me now
  as I ponder, I wonder
How

How could one stand the sight,
  remain,
    and not take flight or fight
How dare one stare right back
  into the void
   of all We lack

As I look away
  grey skies dim
  sun falls ill
    with the loss of will
I look away
  as darkness builds
  blots out light
   & all it yields

As I look away
  the blind/dead stare
I look away
  as I still care

Through apathy, cynicism, nihilistic disregard
  the blood still flows
    from all that's scarred
The sight of all this cold blood pales
  just as the scene of all that fails

As I look away
  I can't turn back
I look away
  As all fades black

As I look away
  It remains and stares
I look away
  as nothing dares

I no longer see
  nor wish to be seen
As all I see
  Should be in quarantine
As all I'd be
  is viewed Obscene

As I look away
  Disdain does too
I look away
  as most things do
Unable to see
  what else to do
...

Dream-˃Life-˃Lies-˃Deaths...

  Once upon a dream
or more often it would seem
A tale was made to tell
  of men in heaven & hell
Through the later to reach the former
  and make hearts feel much warmer

As lives went on this way
  these dreams became the days
and nightmares claimed the dark
  as if upon a lark

Eyes adapted to this view
  and ceased to see anew
both in darkness & in dream
  No more to know, but seem

Impressions' fading marks
  within their stagnant parks
where many gather not to see
  what is there, or what might be
but stare at whatever was
  and only just because

An act of some facade
  excuses to applaud
as lies become the norm
  for all to just conform

with truth locked in some cage
  and obscured by Impostures' haze
while dreamers seek liberation
  but must tread through degradation
as the lies are imposed so strong
  and for so very long

Perpetuated, even to death
  but negated in each true breath
...

NotLove, NotHate...

I doubt that I'm capable
of love
And I don't think I can
truly hate

In both love & hate
something takes precedence
over your own concerns
As feelings become more contingent
on external things
than internal conditions

I can't get that far
from where I live in my own head
My concerns never seem to reach
much farther than my self

It's not hate
that possesses me
Not love
that compels me
For my life is all
I possess
And it is by this truth
that I am solely owned

So my hate is not quite grown
and my love is of its own
For this truth, I remain
alone

When the Mirror Scowls Back...

See the sight
of seeing through
See this scowl
as something new

The black of
dilated pupils' gaze
Swollen like a
spreading fire's blaze

Reflected in this
dark
A truth of vision
stark
  raving
    mad

When I scowl
and the mirror does
  right back
When I howl
and the echoes trace
  right back

Reflections
of projections
not just more deflections

Absorbed into my skull
Soaking blood-stained soul
Reminding of the wHole

The mirror scowls
as I growl back
Tension mounts
and leaves no slack

Anger to
and anger from
received past due
with more to come

If I lash out
the mirror will crack
Then seven years
will break right back

In broken shards
of familiar fragments scattered
unmeasured yards
of beaten paths so battered

In crimson-tinged treads
where angered steps did roam
are traces of the glass
expelled from mirror's home

When the mirror scowls
be silent, be still
contain your self
control your will
and the mirror may teach you
this priceless skill

Remised...

The Genius
The Diligent
The Virtuous
  Dying
      Unknown
      Unappreciated
      Unwelcomed

A mind given
 to deepest thoughts
Entombed
  amidst the colloquially superficial

Hands forged
  by valiant efforts
Bound or buried
  in servitude of the delinquent and decay

Noblest Hearts
  of most honorable and heroic souls
Diluted and distilled
  within the ebb and flow
   of the perpetual downward spiral

It makes those that look up
  hang down their heads
Remised
 to see both sky & solid grounds
Collapse
  Into the vastly vapid void
    of diminishing days
      and darkening dawns

Schizms...

All things are
divided

They are
separated
as what they are
from what they
are not

Things cannot be
what they are
without separation
What would something be
if not
divided
from everything
it is not?

Individual things
separate
from all
other things

Separated from
the masses
the whole
oblivion
etc,
    etc,
       etc.

To be anything
and
For anything to be
Any-Thing
at all
Must
divide

The Schizm
of self
into
its own
is an act of
synchronization
as well as
individuation
&c,
    &c,
         &c

For all that is
Is its Own
amidst
all that it is not
...

An excerpt from my book...

201.04 The Shrine…

I began to engage in deep introspections concerning the truth of my-self in this place… One night, under a heavy curtain of clouds, there was no visible starlight, and the moon’s reflections were lost… From one darkness to another, my mind slipped into an abysmal sleep… Within the darkness of this slumber, something else began…

It began in the manner that dreams do, with no true beginning… Initially, there was nothing in this dream… By nothing, I mean that there was only a black void where nothing existed… Even I didn’t seem to exist in the void of this dream… I only seemed to become present within the dream in a most detached sense…

In the ethereal sense that dreams are allowed to make, I seem to find my-self in the darkness of this dream… My-self is not something I can sense in any real manner… A sense of being drawn inwards propels me… I begin to drift inside of the dreaming void… The dream makes it known to me that I am drifting towards my self…

The greatest sense of detachment is prevalent throughout this darkened dream… My self exists apart from my dreaming-mind, and the void exists beyond these dissociations, etc, etc, etc… It’s as if there isn’t any such thing as space/time …

Despite the darkness and surreal detachment, I drift without motion towards this sense of my self… Somehow, I begin to sense that I am drifting closer to my self in this void… Then I begin to see the darkness as obscuring my ability to perceive my self…

In this non-sense of dreaming, I see that my self is not only obscured by darkness, but also by a collage of forms… The forms them-selves are also dark, and only appear as less darkened mass… None of the forms can be seen clearly enough to be identified as anything in particular… Everything remains obscured from me…

As I observe the forms, they seem to be attaching them-selves to what my dreaming-mind associates with my self… The forms seem to appear out of nowhere in the void, and drift towards the area around my unseen self… They appear to be forming some sort of formless shrine… This shrine is to my self, and precedes its presence…

Formless figures affix them-selves to the shrine, and immediately begin to degrade… Fragments of the black shapeless forms crumble away from the shrine, and become evaporated in the nothingness of the void… As this is happening, the remnants of the shapeless forms seem to dissolve into each-other… These dissolving forms are diluted into the whole of them, and form the shapeless structure of the shrine… Nothing holds any form in this dream, not even the shrine…

A terrifying sense begins to possess my dreaming-mind in this darkened dream… Suddenly, I begin to fear that my self might become dissolved into the formlessness of the shrine… My drifting presence becomes forcefully propelled by a desire to break through the formlessness of the shrine… I plunge through the formless-forms, and submerge my dreaming-presence beneath them… Another vacant void exists between the penetrated shrine and my unseen self…

I am still unable to perceive my self in this void of voids… The shrine disappears into the outer void, as I drift deeper and deeper towards my sensed self…

Within this dream, I begin to wonder… What will happen if I find my self? What would become of me, if I were to discover my self? Would I become diluted into my self, or would my self become diluted into me? How would I be able to merge with my self, or avoid such a merger? What am I to do? Terror grips my dreaming-mind, as I continue to drift through this void of voids…

I become detached from even the very act of drifting… At this point, I no longer have any intentions of drifting towards the core of my self… Instead, it is as if I continue drifting in spite of my dreaming-presence… Wondering what there might be within this void and beyond it, I continue to drift…

With a maddening subtlety, my dreaming fades into my obliviousness of waking… As I transition into waking, the dreamscape’s darkness becomes the blackened night… My drifting through the dream’s void of voids fades into a sense of falling… Instead of colliding with my self in the dream, I collapse onto the earthly surface beneath me…

Another kind of darkness follows this for what can’t be measured in increments of time… When I wake from this darkness, I realize that I have fallen from my resting place… I look up to see the damaged floor of my sky-shanty, directly above me… Then I realize that I might have been knocked unconscious by the fall… If this assertion is true, I might also have acquired a concussion… My memory reminds me, it is not advisable to sleep with a concussion… Obliged to remain awake, my mind seems to be in bad shape from the fall, the dream, &c, &c, &c…

My mind continues to consider the many aspects of the dream… Painfully awake, I think of the dream, my life, my self, &c, &c, &c… Even after the sun rises fully above me, my thoughts continue as if they are still in this dark dream… Was it the dream or the fall that had brought me down to this? I thought…

Flashing Smiles/Fading Frowns...

A flashy smile
A lingering frown
  Then the noose
  or the bullet
  or the razor's sharp edge
Slicing slow
  across arteries & veins
As if the affliction were no deeper
  than pools of blood
  or bone's marrow
As if death could be let out bleeding
and life could remain
  everlasting
    in emptied arteries and veins
Instead of draining life in blood
  and leaving only death in tact

The Reaper leaves tears
  as it collects the never seen
  but clearly missed
     like some warped & twisted Santa
 an altogether different form of clause

The remnant frown fades
  into a blank expression
as everything else is erased
and the frown is transferred
  unto another's longing face

This is the story of an ending
  with no resolution
Only destitution
  and so many pages left blank instead

A smile will flash
Though the frown still lingers
The smile will not last
And the frown will remain far too long
but it to
 will surely fade

If the blank & buried faces
Could only frown again
They would surely smile
even if only to be seen within

After the Summit...

The wish granted
& battle won
Earnings
  paid
Honors
  received
Success
  achieved

but then

Upon the pinnacle's peak
Gazing out with epiphanous eyes
Everything scene
Is seen to be beneath
For soaring birds
leave all the earth below

So it's dive right in
or fall back down

Either way
Eyes will look up again
at another distant peak
And feet will more forward
As hands reach
to grasp whatever rests above them
As the next ascent begins

Summit after
summit
The elevation
and the dive
Somehow the gravity of it all
is greater than the heights of peaks
and far beyond the sums
of each and every fall

Where Darkness Shines...

Nocturnal Conditions
See the darkness
clear and bright
See oblivion
in all its might

Breaks in clouds
admit the stars
Breaks the shrouds
revealing scars

Light seeps through
even when it's cast out
From distant ghosts, unto...
abysmal whereabouts

In darkness, light can blind
In the light, the dark will dim
In both some say they find
the glimmers of their whim

Nights so quiet
the silence itself is hushed
In shades of black, blue, and violet
reflected lights have blushed

The secrets of the moon
that know the silenced tune
Will sing in absent voices
Or howl like rabid loons

Streets lit bright
with artificial lumens
Illuminate the sight
of crepuscular/nocturnal humans

Some elated
Others despaired
Perhaps related
In darkly severed pairs

Where darkness shines
Where light is subtle
The silver lines
And reticent rebuttals

As all things end
and nights remain
The light may bend
but not refrain