The transformation immediate.
A vibrant flame erupted from the ash,
chasing away the encroaching shadows.

Panic seized apathy’s inhabitants.
The familiar, emotionless world
was being challenged.

They tried to extinguish the flame,
hurling barbs of doubt
and apathy.

But ash held firm.
The fire within grew stronger,
fuelled by the forgotten dreams of the world.

It spread, flickering at first,
but then catching on
in the hearts of others.

A blacksmith, long resigned to cold metal,
felt the heat of inspiration and
began to forge anew.

An artist,
brush long dormant,
felt the passion to create.

The fire raged,
not with destruction,
but with the promise of rebirth.

As the flames danced,
casting flickering warmth on the land,
apathy began to melt away.

Fear remained.

Fear gnawed at him,
he could hear the shriek.
Telling on someone felt wrong
but the injustice simmered,
especially since
this somebody was plain him.
The crime was there
the wound open.

Grandpa always said,
“Do the right thing.”
So, with a deep breath,
he stood outside the imposing
brick building
took a deep breath and
admitted himself.
Wounds should heal.

The potentials were bright, good family,
devoted Christians and all that.
The mother down to earth
the father had working.

Then terminality came,
no permits discussed,
perceptions irrelevant,
devices almost sensible,
no clear anticipations.

Expectations superseded,
required to reminisce the last kiss.
Lust numb in acquisition for survival,
the good family,
the devoted Christians
became a fade remembrance had to remake,
surfacing only in dark flashes of desperation.

The clocks are clicking,
A reminder of the last trail to fondle dust.

Remember when the rat lied again
and the raven flew away?
Remember when the rat made you
guessing your own self,
your principals and stances.
When the raven flew away?

Remember when crossroads met
and building gave the clues?
Remember when the rat carrying
the smells of the deepest sewers
made you doubt?
When the raven flew away?

Remember when the rat
poisoned you with promises?
Remember when the rat soured
your deems, pushing
to the edge of the
absolute qualm?
When the raven flew away?

Remember?

‘Close the door,’ she said and
moved further in the dark.
‘I don’t like the light,
I hate the bright.’ She said
and she started crying.

He said nothing,
entered the room and
kept away from the stench.
Cheap vodka and sweat,
an insinuation of urine
in the back.

‘Not drunk,’ she fabled ghostly,
her eyes barely moving.
‘Just me,’
Just, I echoed her tone
desperately.
A chorus of fear.

Rackets dancing in
a horrendous plant of
boneless souls.
The tears silent ballet
a dramatic choreography.
A waltz of dread.

‘Not drunk,’ she whispered again,
‘not drunk.’
And the smell of
cheap vodka and sweat
drawn him into limitless misery.
The chain of lies.
Again!

Joel yelled, “I had a ghastly childhood,”
but Mona said nothing.
“I accept the apparent of oblivion,
the neglect and the eruption of loneliness
in a wretched early life.”
Mona said nothing.

“My most elementary demands
for some affection
always faced empty eyes,
a billion years of feeble deception.”
And Mona said nothing.

Joel leaped in the dark his voice trailing a gasp
and Mona was alone.
With or without Liam,
Mona always alone.

A tortured past her only companion
bouncing from one nightmare to the other,
ricochet of directed dim,
a dance of matters dark
and a sneeze of a childhood
Joel echo but never lived.

Mona said nothing.

Four o’clock in the morning and I woke up suddenly
scared from that inside sound.
Checked for you on my side
and you weren’t there,
c’est la vie, little voice screamed in my brain
and then again, que sera sera.

It’s not what I want anymore, baby;
it’s what life takes, what time gives
and then lets you dry.
All along with the bottle,
no ice, straight in the glass,
all the way down the throat.

Five o’clock and I know, baby,
You’re never coming back,
confirmed your replacement,
laying there full presence,
again on my side,
no ice, straight from the bottle.

Intentions unspecified, he glanced somehow
with approvingly familiarity over the alley,
entered and began a silent study of the faces on the street.

Moving past a tall guy with a dirty beard
and a wrinkled face with strong spirit smell, he grinned.
It was like looking at his own reflection.

Then he stared in silent amusement at the round figure
in dark green coat and striped man’s trousers, no shoes,
a flabby woman of medium height,

Short dirty hair, thick eyebrows,
a slim scar from mouth to chin on a face
that otherwise was undistinguished as a peeled potato.

He smirked and pushed further
to stop at a door that opened to spit a girl
attired in a black long dress holding a thick rolled mooster.

The girl stood her back on the wall,
studied the glowing tip of her smoke
to let the smell of weed to take over the alley.

“Last time we had the pleasure,” she said,
“was long time ago. I still remember you.”
He glanced at his wrist watch and said, “I was drunk.”

She shrugged, then she stood away from the wall
moved to the door, entered and closed behind her
leaving the memory of her smell in the alley.

Having reached no conclusion of the conversation
he moved further to find another door,
perhaps the liquor store,

the footfalls, the mysterious prowlers
of his addictions that can give him
another turn with the girl that smoked.

The air is silent tonight, no more secrets;
everything is out in the blue.
The stars are unvoiced, no more whine;
nothing in the dark.

It was a night like this she said she loved him,
and it was that once, but
among all the lies didn’t sound true;
like dirt after the rain.

Jan never answered back, there was naught to say,
he had learn very young
that love is for kids and the rich
And he was the filth of the poor.

Not that it did matter,
after all the stars didn’t care
and the air was silent
like everything should have been.

Sat on a red light,
watching my life going by;
so I made a stop in a small pub,
the only life glow in a dark alley,
“bourbon, no water, no ice”,
I asked, for the girl to reply,
“in the end we all die.”
I felt swiftly old.

I shouldn’t drink but
I cannot stop the thirst,
“fill it again honey”, I said,
“bourbon, no water, no ice”.
“Any favourites?” she asks,
“the one that slays faster,” I said.
I am old.