The Wake

Obsidian:
A marble sheen covers the stone –
Menacing, the towers stand harrowing down
to the bystanders. The tips grapple the shafts of sun
pouring between the caverns of clouds,
feeding obsidian from the turn of the first degree
to the final beats of overcast reflections.

A form lost in forms. A paper crane,
its wings fixed to the point opposite –
a steady wind washes upon the
throbbing blades of green.
A paper crane stands true to the typing
among the folds.

On street corners, children walk,
their eyes fixated on the laces which
tie each together.
A stone, a crack,
soft earth frosted over with oil slicks.
To the right, the unseen fly grasps
the entrails of a decaying finch.
Unnoticed. Unwanted.

In shop windows sit sets of eyelids,
unblinking, unwavering, their glare
ripping halos and pitchforks into able-minded forms.

In great halls, the shadow falls down on the crowd;
The basking in antiphon –
only broken alleys with shards of glass
that mirror so many broken synapses.
Stand true to the forms that block
the sunlight.

Obsidian:
The tool that began
an edge that cut the carcass of knowledge.

For billions of years, the shadow has walked
with the meticulous clock-work of the
ancient stars, graced the sides of monuments
of man and towered over the unseen.