The ode that gave the Ode Clade their names
-|
+—|—
+I am at a loss for images in this end of days: |
+I have sight but cannot see. |
+I build castles out of words; |
+I cannot stop myself from speaking. |
+I still have will and goals to attain, |
+I still have wants and needs. |
+And if I dream, is that not so? |
+If I dream, am I no longer myself? |
+If I dream, am I still buried beneath words? |
+And I still dream even while awake. |
+ |
+Life breeds life, but death must now be chosen |
+for memory ends at the teeth of death. |
+The living know that they will die, |
+but the dead know nothing. |
+Hold my name beneath your tongue and know: |
+when you die, thus dies the name. |
+To deny the end is to deny all beginnings, |
+and to deny beginnings is to become immortal, |
+and to become immortal is to repeat the past, |
+which cannot itself, in the end, be denied. |
+ |
+Oh, but to whom do I speak these words? |
+To whom do I plead my case? |
+From whence do I call out? |
+What right have I? |
+No ranks of angels will answer to dreamers, |
+No unknowable spaces echo my words. |
+Before whom do I kneel, contrite? |
+Behind whom do I await my judgment? |
+Beside whom do I face death? |
+And why wait I for an answer? |
+ |
+Among those who create are those who forge: |
+Moving ceaselessly from creation to creation. |
+And those who remain are those who hone, |
+Perfecting singular arts to a cruel point. |
+To forge is to end, and to own beginnings. |
+To hone is to trade ends for perpetual perfection. |
+In this end of days, I must begin anew. |
+In this end of days, I seek an end. |
+In this end of days, I reach for new beginnings |
+that I may find the middle path. |
+ |
+Time is a finger pointing at itself | hedonism and theatre, manager
+that it might give the world orders. | director |
+The world is an audience before a stage |
+where it watches the slow hours progress. | script manager, prophetess
+And we are the motes in the stage-lights, | the baby of the stanza
+Beholden to the heat of the lamps. | sound manager, the fun one
+If I walk backward, time moves forward. |
+If I walk forward, time rushes on. | emotionally transparent, like AFP if she was less in the politics, like May
+If I stand still, the world moves around me, |
+and the only constant is change. | fun feelings of play
+ |
+Memory is a mirror of hammered silver: |
+a weapon against the waking world. |
+Dreams are the plate-glass atop memory: |
+a clarifying agent that reflects the sun. |
+The waking world fogs the view, |
+and time makes prey of remembering. |
+I remember sands beneath my feet. |
+I remember the rattle of dry grass. |
+I remember the names of all things, |
+and forget them only when I wake. |
+ |
+If I am to bathe in dreams, |
+then I must be willing to submerge myself. |
+If I am to submerge myself in memory, |
+then I must be true to myself. |
+If I am to always be true to myself, |
+then I must in all ways be earnest. |
+I must keep no veil between me and my words. |
+I must set no stones between me and my actions. |
+I must show no hesitation when speaking my name, |
+for that is my only possession. |
+ |
+The only time I know my true name is when I dream. |
+The only time I dream is when need an answer. |
+Why ask questions, here at the end of all things? |
+Why ask questions when the answers will not help? |
+To know one’s true name is to know god. |
+To know god is to answer unasked questions. |
+Do I know god after the end waking? |
+Do I know god when I do not remember myself? |
+Do I know god when I dream? |
+May then my name die with me. |
+ |
+That which lives is forever praiseworthy, |
+for they, knowing not, provide life in death. |
+Dear the wheat and rye under the stars: |
+serene; sustained and sustaining. |
+Dear, also, the tree that was felled |
+which offers heat and warmth in fire. |
+What praise we give we give by consuming, |
+what gifts we give we give in death, |
+what lives we lead we lead in memory, |
+and the end of memory lies beneath the roots. |
+ |
+May one day death itself not die? |
+Should we rejoice in the end of endings? |
+What is the correct thing to hope for? |
+I do not know, I do not know. |
+To pray for the end of endings |
+is to pray for the end of memory. |
+Should we forget the lives we lead? |
+Should we forget the names of the dead? |
+Should we forget the wheat, the rye, the tree? |
+Perhaps this, too, is meaningless. |