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- 09/28/2021
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Disasters, Delights and Other Detours - 100. Two Ballades: Bastion and Complemented
Bastion
One guards an anxious soul for safety’s sake
with fences far too fierce to be dismissed,
and some through every season seem to make
excuses when another might insist
they lie upon his wheel like so much grist
and only in the dawn’s light to bemoan
the treasure stolen from the wrong lips kissed;
as watchful hearts are often overthrown.
For what prize can a random stranger take
that would not make him one more plagiarist,
who would without the least compunction break
that partner held beneath him by the wrist
enticed by guile and fawning to enlist
in legions which the years have only grown
yet in each ear the bitter motto hissed,
as watchful hearts are often overthrown.
So while the planets dance, I lie awake
and wonder why these old bones still exist
as if to cage and cradle one more ache
to supplement a thousand on the list
accumulated since an adolescent tryst,
those many sins for which I must atone,
ecstatic moments when the world seemed blissed
as watchful hearts are often overthrown.
Capricious fate, you love an artful twist
to mold our lives to shapes strange and unknown;
incline your ear when yearning I resist,
as watchful hearts are often overthrown.
Complemented
Consider precious stones that glint and shine
of which the fortunate may stand possessed,
their splendor may the owner fain consign
to iron safe or metal-banded chest
constructed to withstand whatever test,
then stowed in chambers hewn from living rock
to wait in niches shadowed and recessed:
a key is made deep secrets to unlock.
No matter how concealments may combine
with mechanisms crafted by the best
there must yet be a facet of design
allowing him whose fingers they caressed
a visit to that vault upon request
wherein the cherished trove yearns for his knock
that will from time’s strong bands its treasures wrest;
a key is made deep secrets to unlock.
So too it is with secrets that are mine
which long my spirit burdened and oppressed
awaiting whispered words of the divine
to make me sparkle bold at his behest
when he might gaze upon me all undressed,
of pins and springs and tumblers taking stock,
his shaft and shank my pretense to divest:
a key is made deep secrets to unlock.
Your arrows, Eros, could not pierce my breast,
for these were poorly fitted to my block,
but with his spear, all closed things are confessed;
a key is made deep secrets to unlock.
With this final chapter, I lay down my poetic pen. To any of you kind souls who have taken time to read these lines in Disasters, Delights and Other Detours: thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. One hundred entries is plenty for one collection of amateur poetry, and it seems that this may be a good place to stop. I owe special thanks to @AC Benus, whose steadfast help, friendship and support burnished and improved so many of these poems. I am deeply in his debt.
For those heaving a sigh of relief or gasping with trembling hope that I might finally, finally, have finished inflicting poetry on the world, I must disappoint you. There will be more.
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Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you.
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