Stepping Up

Stairs go up, stairs go down
They do not teach "ascension"...
With every step, at every now
They teach the "rest" dimension.

One Day

Of all the days my life has known
There's one above all others
Only one day I truly own
Around it, my life gathers.

It is the day I saw myself
With eyes of pure wonder
As if a puppet on a shelf
Had just begun to wander.

But of that day, one moment still
Stands out brighter than ever
It's when I died of too much thrill
And was reborn forever.

If that one moment were to last
A little while longer
I would have been without a past
Like God, or even stronger.

However, things are meant to pass
One day becomes another
Life oversees the hourglass
That's making time a bother.

Rosebud

Come, quiet this shivering eye
Unprepared for winter,
Hear the late rosebud's soft cry
As it won't bloom, but splinter.

Forgive the truth that came out wrong
In a moment of weakness,
Remember to wrap in a song
The last word of love's witness.

It's late and cold, sheer abyss,
The nightfall's now right here,
Going to sleep without a kiss
Steals each new day a tear.

Thank You for the Music

A symphony dies to be sung
There's music welling up in wonder--
No job for chords or fingers wrung
Fit just to play the tunes of blunder.

Excitement is killed by remorse,
Outbidding passion's claim on love
But still, disrupting this divorce,
The music ripples from above.

It is a music never sung,
Of far-off words remaining mute,
Resounding truer now, when hung,
Than in the days they've taken root.

hung over life

i will stay where you left me
unbegun
not tainted by your temptation
to move on.

living with lies i can bear
it's perhaps truth i can't stand
so thank you for being patient
with my hastiness.

oh my, a crazy world
lives in my head
gambling with the beauty
of tomorrow.

i've turned the corner
just to find my heart arrested
and broken
at the sight of a window not lit.

who would have thought
that i was bugged
the day before yesterday
poisoned by love?

stay here as i turn the corner
once more
hang on until i'm gone
just for the thrill.

is making love really enough
to save
the stroke of luck
from my bare hands?

Glassy Eyes

I fell for eyes of fire
Surprised to see me know
That playing with desire
Is what gives life a go.

But now the course is over
Those eyes have let me down
As darkness, lonely rover,
Has found no king to crown.

I've seen the empty stare,
Gliding to pass me by,
Of glassy eyes too bare
To care if I die.

Yet, under the lost gaze
Avoiding me with grace,
The Nothing set its maze
And caught me... way off base.

The Breaking Point

There is a secret tomb in no man's land,
Forsaken by the gods beyond life's end,
A place rallying lies to guard the truth
That paradise is wilting before youth.

It is the place where Nothingness resides,
Unholy place of God's demise for sides,
But sought by man as an attempt to fly
Rising above his right to live and die.

Something stronger than the feel of power,
Mightier than the rush of the hour,
Forged by the fire built into the flesh,
Breathes the mana that's meant to refresh.

The Rising Star

I've tried to catch a rising star,
My fault...
Its light shines now too far,
Above my vault.

The arching sky across the sea,
Horizons know,
Will never find its stretch a key
Yet stars will glow.

The waves below pester the night
With stifled silence,
Too bad they can never take flight
Nor leave of absence.

But just one star's enough to cast
Showers of light,
Lending the waters its full blast--
Shadow of might.

The Way Back Home

Tonight's strange music pours down the road,
Stillness itself is about to implode,
Ecstatic air presses death to load
The fateful seconds of Time's secret code.

Emotions once hung now raise and walk dead
Hungry to feed on the lives they have had
Lost are all words, nothing's left to be said,
Flowers of mold are now crowning my bed.

On Truth and Power

By all accounts, Truth is weak
Because it does not show its power
Until it is too late.

Power itself is never true
Because every step forward is a lie
Meant to deceive.

The power of Truth moves us through life
But the truth of Power holds us back
In ignorance.

Truth comes forth when Power subsides
So that the unknown become known
In all its might.

Truth has no power for the willing,
But the willing has no power without Truth,
As he only knows the power of Power.

The truth of Power escapes one's will,
Just as the power of Truth goes also unnoticed,
Yet Truth and Power are a couple.

But there's something else, right on the line
Where Truth and Power meet, and that's called life.
Life's power and truth come from Beauty.

Closer Than Touch

At times, I feel that no matter how close I get to what I want, it's just not close enough. Closeness seems to long for its completion in touch. But if touch is indeed the limit of closeness, then it follows that touching is what also destroys the feeling of closeness. There is closeness as long as there is distance, and the closer you get, the heavier is the burden of the distance left to be crossed. Physical space is the expression of metaphysical estrangement.

There is no real, physical space between you and what is rightfully yours, because what is owned can neither be explored nor conquered. I, of myself, can know nothing about me. This is why otherness is so important, because only what is truly foreign to us (metaphysically) can mirror back to us our real self. Otherwise, in the absence of otherness, the only self-image we may get about ourselves will be a narcissistic one, that is, the visible, knowable part of who we are. But our real self, contrary to an image, cannot be captured, manipulated or used in any way. Not of our own will, in any way, because an "other" can always do that.

But so much about space. Space is a very unfortunate invention, because there is "space" even where there is no actual space left, such as in touch. Far from completely eliminating space, touching actually opens up a new kind of space--a metaphysical one. And metaphysical space feels heavier and much harder to overcome than physical space.

Metaphysics is what separates me from myself, or who I really am from the pitfalls of my mere image (that is, from who I think myself to be). Once the touch shortcuts closeness, a whole new metaphysical dimension rises to the horizon of being, and one is left to contemplate this new "space" introduced by the appropriating effect of touch. Touching something means to make it yours, to appropriate it not only physically, but also with its entire metaphysical depth. Thus, once something is touched and the distance separating you from it is gone, another kind of "distance" sets in. When something is being touched (and felt, physically) it becomes a conquered territory, over which you no longer have any power because it becomes a part of you, as in a sort of metaphysical assimilation. While there still is a physical distance left (keeping you a formally separate entity), there is also a feeling of connectedness, which vanishes (or begins to die) as soon as the barrier of touch has been crossed.

We can only conquer what we have first desired, but then this means that it was the object of our very desire that had conquered us first, by seduction. One can only desire to have that which in fact already "has" him caught and seduced.

This is why sex is the ultimate gratification--because it rids one (at least for a moment) from the heavy burden of self. The most difficult thing in the world is to live justly with yourself, and to bear the consequences of your own actions instead of trying to run away from them. Therefore, people "give" themselves one to another, carelessly or with an interest in mind, but only in sex does one escape from himself completely. Sex obscures, shades or completely obturates one's metaphysical idiosyncrasies and sense of alienation. One the one hand, this metaphysical inadequation to who we are is essential for living; on the other hand, it is what makes life impossile. This is the double bind, which sex seems to be able to overcome (even though in illusion).

What makes two people interested in each other (sexually attracted and aroused) is not the glow of pure affection, which is the expression of sympathy for what is recognized as yours, known, or friendly (and, indeed, affectionate feelings are not conducive to sexual behavior but rather to unconditional loyalty); instead, sex unites disaffected people, and sexual satisfaction increases when there is a matching degree of disaffection, thus gradually making room for jealousy and possessiveness in the relationship. During sex, space and distance become extinct by way of touching, but in fact what has come together as one has no chance of lasting, because touch brings closeness to an end. Closer than close is impossibile, except as an illusion, while in the realm of illusion possibility can only be simulated.

The same things said about space can also be said about time. After all, time is just another kind of space, even though it is a special one--the space of our lives. What touch does to the distance, being on time does to time. If one comes on time for a meeting, he necessarily misses it, because in order to "meet" your destiny you must not be present to it. If you are early, you may only hope that destiny will be late, so that you can meet it somewhere outside its borders, without even counting on it happening.

For me, it is a bit too late. And I can only hope that, somehow, my being late will have happened too early.

Cornered...

Time closes in and ties me up
I'm scared of conclusions,
A lonely bastard in a trap
Afraid of his delusions.

I'm anguished as never before
Exceeded by my fears,
The walls that I'd like to ignore
Entomb my life with tears.

I guess the pain of love is sweet
When hit by Cupid's arrow,
And even death seems a nice treat
For treading paths too narrow.

There's so much love to give away
In myriads of fashions,
That I find solace when I play
The game of empty passions.

I know there isn't any hope
For time to grow me younger,
But then I know time is aslope
And feeds one's every hunger.

With tickets booked and weapons packed
I'm on, aboard love's cruiser,
And if I am to die in war
I won't be just a loser...