poetry

The Thin Wire

/ Daniel Swearingen / 106 Comments


“Luck is a very thin wire between survival and disaster, and not many people can keep their balance on it”. – Hunter S. Thompson

It took place by a dark bayou, the war in her mind. It raged both within and without her. It happened with hardly a sound, say that gasp she heard before she gave up the ghost and simply went away. Simply went away.

The Daemon’s eyes were lightning, seizing the warm June air about his glare, making it smell of Sulphur and musty faire. He spoke in a voice of judgment taught to him by his father the deceiver. It was his only weapon. His words formed circles around the head of the brown haired maiden, and with each syllable that was twisted; she jerked her body as if she was receiving pain. For indeed she appeared bereaved, and sadly enough her image itself began to change. It was with a ghastly sigh, a sorrow untold, a difference between the fantasy and the lie, the keeper of breath and the devil that defies. The war of the mind between judgment and the divine. The thin wire that separates the divide.

Still, lay still my faire maiden, rest thy torn, and shattered mind, gentle here by this dark water, a bottle by thy side. Gone is guile of some temptation that is to try a greater high. No more days of emulation, loss of weight the candy’s eye. Now we see you in death’s slumber, form so small beneath humid skies. Shadows summoned, wrap around you, a smaller form, have not seen I. Ere the cries of those who love you, those to whom there was no bye. Read they now of your alienation, in “The Catcher and the Rye“, and how the thin wire breaks inside. For when it breaks, it breaks inside.

Cast her spirit on the water; let her soul find comfort there. Watch it fly then into thin wonder air. There is no judgment there. Had she not some good within her, that extinguished by a rain. That of falsehood and addiction that fell upon her by disdain. Gather here, you grounded muses, those who taunt and flame. Look at her form still before you know she fell in war, that conflict in your name. For her thin wire is stretched among you, from one to each your much the same. Is it not true one less among you, and yet you feel no shame. Not one or two will ever change. For though she dies just barely, her thin wire cut in two. Something that has compassion nearby will welcome her completely and new. For wars are fought in many battles, in this world to stars beyond our own. This now still faire maiden, has moved on to take a future home.

Still, lay still my faire maiden, rest thy torn, and shattered mind…

For the faire maiden (for there on the other side you now know who you are) and the many more out there, whom embrace a battle inside all their own. It is not too late, wait but just a little while. – 06.30.2021 – דָנִיֵּאל

Here & There (You Love Me)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 105 Comments


“Maybe I’m amazed at the way you pulled me out of time. You hung me on the line. Maybe I’m amazed at the way I really need you.” – Paul McCartney

“Maybe I’m Amazed” ….

Paul McCartney was singing as I wrote your name on my hand, And I could feel the ink seeping into my soul like a flame, taking my heart to a place I could not understand. Still, it was clear to me that here and there you loved me, and here and there I would never leave you.

I am just wandering the cosmos, when we meet, a sad bogus boy, with a spark of destiny, that only someone different can help me reach. I am looking for you to be like me, while you are looking for me to be me. For you see I have been many places, through doorways and values of times. I have seen the beginning and the lie that ends all time. Still nothing in all of those places, has been like here and there and how you have loved me. No nothing has been like this very moment in this stillness and how you love me.

I whitewashed the shadows, the link to the divine. I hid beneath memories that reached to the sky. I said I was a secret, that really was a lie. Still here and there you loved me. I drove to Albuquerque with a search a hope to find. Seven cities of Cibola of a mystic kind. I dug so many tunnels, I forgot which one was a mine. Your feet in my shoes while I am drunk in summertime. Still here and there you loved me. For G_D gives to me a mystery, a path that follows my own. A pleasure, a pain, a universe I cannot define. A placeholder you call our home. It carries an air of some kindness, sometimes a hatred so deep. Still, what I would see as challenge, is still something I would complete. With you here and there, still I love you. Still here and there you love me.

I was a whole lot more than he was, you were a bit more than her. Time was turning, spinning more than sand. The end of an age was coming. My age, my time. And when the night was silent, the ghost no longer in my head, I looked at you sleeping, touched your neck, with my wet lips. And it was okay. For while outside lightning split the sky and made glass in the sand. Bad angels fell from my sky, things I saw went away. Naked monsters no longer entwined. Here and there I loved you. Here and there you loved me.

Paul McCartney was singing as I wrote your name on my hand, And I could feel the ink seeping into my soul like a flame, taking my heart to a place I could not understand. Still, it was clear to me that here and there you loved me, and here and there I would never leave you…..

For Susan– 06.14.21 – דָּנִיֵּאל‎ 

The Lost Book of Shadows

/ Daniel Swearingen / 108 Comments


“And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.” – Roald Dahl

“How many pages do you think we have”, he says his blue eyes wide with interest. “More than enough to make this kind of a Bible”, I smile, holding up the three ring black binder to the star filled sky. “It’s a book of secrets alright”, he says nodding his head furiously up and down, his taped black framed glasses sliding down his nose. “We need to hide it where we both know where it is”, I say my smile disappearing, as the night air around us seems to chill. Much too cold for the end of May, I am thinking. “Yeah”, he says. “We need to make sure we don’t forget where we put it”.

What is done here upon this night, by this stream, my boyhood rite. What is done here beneath these bluffs, shape-shifting shadows, on midnight’s cusp. What is done here while stars fall fast, turning the moon from full to the past. Time travelers move beyond my dreams, splitting the heavens and all their seams. For what do I see this vision faire, something found relieved from its lair, a secret lost upon life’s whim, buried beneath and now I know when. Tousled hair on two boy’s blue, who buried a book of all they knew. Down the Coolidge Arroyo, and then a swim, in muddy cold water, that sucks you in. Twelve steps ahead on an island mound, and then another swim, with a prayer not to drown. Seven steps forward and nine to the right, to the dark overhang, where we stand with our book and two penlights.

What do we own but our own minds, what makes us ghost, when we do die? The answers to what lies within, the secret handshake, the hidden grin. Who killed Bobby, and who shot Jack, the answers might stay in this book so black. Does time hold us, or do we hold time? Are we here as a glimpse, or a reflection of our mind? And what of dragons, and what of arks, are both really hidden in our friendship in this dark. For in this book lies craft and Zen, love and character, spells and sin. For dreams have told us, visions we have had, that the past is our future, in a circle it will last. And the doomsday clock that we have numbers circled within, will end all time, when a new age says begin.

“Do you think we will remember where we hid that thing”? My teeth are chattering, I am cold and I smell like muddy river water. “You won’t”, he says his voice sounding more distant and light. “But I do”, he whispers, almost quietly, almost gone, almost a ray of early morning light, for it is a dream. It is a dream. – 05.24.2021 – דָנִיֵּאל

The Call to Prayer

/ Daniel Swearingen / 90 Comments

“If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.” – Meister Eckhart

Heed me, need me, call me please me, oh holy.

The call to prayer is my writing. A story not based in my pride. A part of me of which I am revealing, for which in fact, I know not how or know why. It is like a question that was raised to me this morning, as I saw the Colorado Mountains that reached to the sky. The words they came from compassion born from inside me, “If they glorify me above their stature, can you do not the same in word and in rhyme”.

The call to prayer rest inside me. In a place battered by hell. Deep in the valley of spirit and bone, a link to the divine that lives to tell. The story of letters and numbers, of seals and mystical grails. Sometimes uttered as sounds and music, sometimes screams and wails. It is true I have been not a temple, a prophet, or seer of worlds. Still when I pray something happens, the shadows inside me unfurl. Orbital echoes of summoning, that form beyond a divide, that whose names goes unspoken, becomes one with my creature inside. A feeling of fullness eternal, what is cannot be denied, for G_D as she most perpetual, has made me sane while the world goes crazy outside. To pray to bless my creator, the coals of her mercy inside, hallowed be thy creation, your footprint of breath carries my life. Your footprint of breath carries my life.

So here, I am a part of a missive, a call to prayer, let me praise, let me praise. The seals holding the eternal bond within me break when I open to pray. This a part of my union, between she and my life day to day. The call to prayer from the start of the cosmos, on to on goes it on to each day. How does it help to sustain me in the here and the now of this day? The answer is found in a mystery, a word from the ancient of days. “Know me to know you intensely; I am, so you are each day, spoken and born so intimately, am I not worthy of praise. Am I not worthy of praise?”

The call to prayer is my writing. A story not based in my pride. A part of me of which I am revealing, for which in fact, I know not how or know why. It is like a question that was raised to me this morning, as I saw the Colorado Mountains that reached to the sky. The words they came from compassion born from inside me, “If they glorify me above their stature, can you do not the same in word and in rhyme”.

Heed me, need me, call me please me, oh holy. – דָנִיֵּאל – 05.05.2021

The Precious

/ Daniel Swearingen / 103 Comments


Kaitlyn Swearingen

“The most precious on this earth is Love” – Lavinia Valeriana

“You are my “Peter Pan” she said, her bright blue eyes dancing reflecting the bright full moon that cast it’s magical beams through her bedroom window. “What are you then, “squirt”, I asked her trying to look as serious as possible. “I am your precious”, she said, her blue eyes turning into stars and planets and becoming a universe all-consuming.

In a world where time stood still, when all memory had gone to sleep. All our secrets held our hope, spinning circles, jumping rope. To the moon, you would cry with the fiercest look that made me smile. Such is this, and such is that, you drew the pictures, of our compact. Beyond two stars, second from right, magic perfected, when we took flight. In dimensions did we ride, upon the words of which we spoke, incantations so inspired by a story or a joke. Came we to another land in a box made for a boat, rowing water with our hands, until our laughter finally broke. Tis the season, which I fly, fight the witch was your reply. Make me precious throughout the land; I said I will for I am The Pan. Be they ghouls or evil cares, I will fight them upon a dare. Be my precious, my princess lord, as she knights me with a cardboard sword. Be my precious for all the years, never let this magic disappear.

So it went from night to night, when the dusk turned to moonlight. For the full moon went nowhere, stayed it steady within our lair. How full enchantment can make you grow, when your own seed has turned to gold. In a minute of childhood find, immortality in your mind. Not an interest or a care, when the moon is in your eye, throwing caution to the wind with my precious by my side. Thinking time will never end, thinking this time will never die.

Now the day came when time appeared, second hands from everywhere and on my scalp appeared a gray, and my precious went away. Such was this, and such was that, fading pictures of our compact. Still at times upon the phone, when I hear her voice so clear, just a bright note in atmosphere. How it takes me to a time, never ending how sublime. Moves me beyond two stars so near, second from the right, this way my dear. Succumbs me to a different land, knights me as “The Pan”. From the cradle to the grave how my precious saved the day. From the cradle to Neverland, full of wonder through times of sand, through the veil hand in hand. Through the veil hand in hand.

“You are my “Peter Pan” she said, her bright blue eyes dancing reflecting the bright full moon that cast it’s magical beams through her bedroom window. “What are you then, “squirt”, I asked her trying to look as serious as possible. “I am your precious”, she said, her blue eyes turning into stars and planets and becoming a universe all-consuming.

For my own immortal precious Kaitlyn. -04.02.21 – דָנִיֵּאל

The Jerusalem Theory

/ Daniel Swearingen


“We contain the shapes of trees and the movement of rivers and stars within us.” – Patrick Jasper Lee

His screams awaken me again. “You saw the holy city again”? The question slips from my just awakened mouth. I instantly regret the sound my question carries. “No daddy”, he says, his eyes filling with tears, “I am the holy city”. “I am the holy city”.

He awakes within his battles, turns an inward eye to see and it rolls an observation, of intuition around the holy city, which he conceived. For his mind, it is a treasure, built from time on eternity. An eschatology that confounds a modern world immersed in academic degrees.

He awakes within his battles, and fashions safe high walls. Thick in stone and drying mortar, higher towers to see it all. He circles round and round his sanctuary, placing angels four fathoms tall. His altar deeply buried in the center of the great all. He hums his body is the temple, he grasp the illusion of a call, an obtrusive whispering dragon woman, who says the time is his to call. For his mind is the eternal city, that withstands all carrion calls, underneath a canopy of G_Ds great favor, he watches dark large figures fall. Now center to this theory, of time, and what he sees, is the notion that his mind is a city in the Judean Mountains between the Mediterranean and deep Dead Sea. It’s a notion built in neurons and synapses we cannot believe, that the senses of an individual is in a world we just cannot see.

His nightmares are built in Babylon, by guile and snakes out of trees. The touching sounds of withered fingers scraping across a skin he cannot see. They want to hold him captive in a darkness ruled by grief, a unipolar world of chaos, the one inhabited by you and me. They want to tear down the walls of his Jerusalem to discover what it is he sees. They come as warriors clothed in confusion, not the peacemakers or helpers they claim to be. For in Babylon they do not understand the thoughts so different, or the visions they cannot see.

So, war comes against his city. In a rolling raging sea, armed with all of life’s armchair seers from the science of life that is brief. They call upon their allies from the Euphrates; bring your archers to shoot the breech. Let us understand this city’s weakness. Let it fall beneath our feet. Call down our god’s of human frailty, of science of no degree, let this be that, and that a lesson, not forgotten for all to see. Let us learn this place of mystery, let us in by self-decree. What we know from our own learning is what we worship as our deity.

In the end as all in final, in the end that comes so brief, there stands the ruins of Babylon, while Jerusalem can still be seen. In the end is still the mystery, the blessing of his thoughts to be, for the magic of his inward motion, is a city that holds its keep. Is a city that holds its keep.

He awakes within his battles, turns an inward eye to see and it rolls an observation of intuition around the holy city, which he conceived. For his mind, it is a treasure, built from time on eternity. An eschatology that confounds a modern world immersed in academic degrees. – 03.21.21 – דָנִיֵּאל

For the millions who fall on the spectrum in this alien world.

Ivanhoe (An Addendum)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 82 Comments

“Is death the last sleep? No, it is the last final awakening.” – Sir Walter Scott, Ivanhoe

For Ivanhoe sailed on a blue cold sea, ever present from what could be, to be a knight of war no more, to embrace his final score. No more dust and blood of war, just better passions on heavens shores.

Hold still thy Eastern windows, those upon the North Sea, facing toward Jerusalem, where there I will soon be free. Breaking now my spirit that, which is a loom, weaved by darkened feelings, comes the witch before the moon. What was my father’s fortune, tithes and land and silk, lay I now before thee, thy daemons and their ilk. Forge the steel of Canaan a double-sided seal, who knows if it is really, really real. Here now I pray, between the stones from another day. Standing still, I cry as all men cry, “will G_D let me stay”? Whom is now upon me? Darkness or the light by day? What is its fashion, poet or warrior fallen by a blade? So, this night, this starless, soulless night, filled by shadows, great with evil’s plight. Is it mine to reckon, to stiffen with my arm? By these shores of England in a calm or storm. Still I hear thee bade me, come unto my breast. Oh my G_D you know me, in this you know me best.

I thought upon this hardly, when first a sword I sheathed, to carry death upon my hip, better to give unto than receive. For all the years of battle when my mind saw blood red, I never thought that demise could come peaceful for men once bled. For what the passion of all true things, those men of oath can often decree. Their minds lacking character in the power of control they deceive. Their laws held high on banners, held to heaven’s doors. From love and savage battle, they are laws that never bind to us subsequently once we are no more. For here, it makes no difference, this crusade now described, in final breathing moments, to a black angel. Oh her eyes.

Names, names, names I would be remiss, not to say my true love’s name, in death I truly miss. Daughter of the misty lake, Saxon queen whose sweet lips I often taste. She who leaves before me, now by a flowered filled lake. For all the swords and lances, have I thrust, to give unto this dark angel all my trust? To view Rowena in a land so faire. Very different over there. For ever Loxley perhaps I shall miss, its stone and thatch and heavy mist. For what has come in what I see in these boiling eyes nonmoving before me. Just a calm within a storm, in a circle that feels so warm. In a circle that feels so warm.

For Ivanhoe sailed on a blue cold sea, ever present from what could be, to be a knight of war no more, to embrace his final score. No more dust and blood of war, just better passions on heavens shores. – 02.20.2021 – דָנִיֵּאל

 

Night of Things (Mayhem)

/ Daniel Swearingen / 73 Comments


“There are methods to creating a mayhem that sounds different from your usual mayhem. Because mayhem and a heavy drum backbeat end up sounding like Green Day or something. But if you put a different beat within it to create some air and lightness, the chaos comes through better.” – Nick Cave

It was mayhem to drive up the mountain at midnight, to visit my father’s grave. A night of things, both describable, and some not, that guided me up the sliver of a winding road to find my better angels. Perhaps daddy spoke to me, perhaps he did not, but something did. Something deep and dark, that deals with mayhem in the most effective way.

Whisper’s whisper all around me, from the mountains, crags and high plains. Whisper’s whisper ere, thy name. Blessings to this night of things, ere mayhem love is still the same.

Ere these feelings, ere these symptoms on this highway, underneath your heavens a spinning shell. Ere I am dying, awhile I am driving, ere I am dying, silence around me I die so well. For mayhem finds me upon your starlight headed toward highlands, beneath crosswinds, nothing happens, when something happens near well. It has been a long while since I came here. To your graveyard, here upon this highest vale, oh daddy you brought me, to speak of mystery of shine that blinds the heart when mayhem the truth will not tell. What a fortune, what a beauty here near your buried ashes, the book of secrets the night does tell. In the snow shining by car light night of things save me from the tides of hell. Ere I go up on this mountain, sing a night song my troubles fail, in the gloom of skyward shadows of timeless winter trees so pale.

Ere oh purpose, why I cry out, begging mercy from those who sleep. Laying snowbound in all their ashes so frozen here beneath my feet. Ere the circle turning faster stealing secrets from this a keep, just standing before Ezekiel’s wheels all I can do is weep. Ere the mayhem of the signal. Ere, what is hidden beneath cross beams? What comes from all around me before one A.M.?

Whisper’s whisper all around me, from the mountains, crags and high plains. Whisper’s whisper ere, thy name. Blessings to this night of things, ere mayhem love is still the same.

For something here is me, something comes on this night of things, and through all nature, begs me bind, thoughts of treasures beneath frozen vines, I think I finally see. That for all mayhem that stays inside, it reveals the signs of life indeed. For where there is death there must be life to see. – 01.23.21-
דָנִיֵּאל

Victoria

/ Daniel Swearingen


” Sing your death song and die like a hero going home”. – Tecumseh

If I should claim how great thou art, my lady. With thy pale dress, and thy white face. Moving G-d like before me while angels wait.

In and out of minutes, heartbeats slowing, I see her dancing upon a dawn filled sea. Planting footsteps that are visible to only those who would see. And it seems that she would kiss me nicely. And it seems she would fly with me. For she is of the beginning. The beginning of my eternity.

If I should hear her if I should go to play. If my shoes should not fit and stay unlaid. If voices should become a second place. On a present morning before the sun has thought to raise. If change should happen, music and light replace my pleasant grace. If G_D should find me willing to ride the wind on her beckon of faith. My heart broken, my breath that can longer taste. My taste for earth fainter than my fading face. Oh, then Victoria I will ascend in numbers across this water so chaste. While there are seconds moving, time that I no longer make, my soul moving, into spirit beyond the tides that break.

If moving morning shadows should bring me angels. If their high notes should barriers break. If I should find myself willing, to touch her face. A distant journey, now a present place. No longer a question, indecision, or an unintelligible race. If I should no longer suffer, descend to a stoic held together by man’s science or medical case. Know that I am moving upon that water, my eyes wider, no terror left to shake. If I should claim how great thou art, my lady. With thy pale dress, and thy white face moving G-d like before me while angels wait. In death I trip, but so quickly I reach and touch your blessed lace. That which makes you in me. That which you let me take.

If I should walk in mystery, into thy ark with such an airless ease. If their would-be Seraphim that fold their wings when I, upon my journey make. Touching syllables, that only immortals make, crying holy, while she dances for me. If I am growing lighter, closer than, closer than my G_D to thee. For here there would be no lessor freedoms than what she has made in me. If she would make an equation, a variable to a prophesy, it would be that I am with Victoria, for in Victoria I have come to be.

If I should claim how great thou art, my lady. With thy pale dress, and thy white face moving G-d like before me.

Jovine DeMarcus’s daughter carries his thoughts and blood deep within her. I am married to her. Jovine taught me how to pull wire, hammer a nail, and put together the most intricate electrical wiring equations. I taught him about the mountains. He wanted me to call him dad and I fought it. I fight it no longer. Jovine went to his Victoria, his woman of the water and mountain on December 23rd, 2020 at 4:15 AM in the morning. Sweet travels Dad. Sweet travels. Miss you much more than I ever thought I would. 12.31.20- דָּנִיֵּאל

 

Magnum Mysterium Phantasm

/ Daniel Swearingen / 95 Comments


“The unknown is not that the soul never changes. The mystery is that the spirit does.” – DS

I thought myself a haunted house in a deep darkened wood, and every December I changed and became whole again.” -DS

There were angels dancing in shadows. There were angels darkened in shape. Singing magnum mysterium. Magnum mysterium. Awake!

Magnum mysterium phantasm is a spot in my mind, a haunted memory of pictures I cannot find. Darkness, darkness hello my old friend. A world floating with numbers, where does reason end. Houses for living, a house for the dead. Houses for living, a house for the dead. Houses for living…

There sits in a wood a house broken, scarred, and battered and worn. It has eyes on an inward soul searching, haunted on the eve of a storm. The snow it falls on it duly, the ice it makes its way in. There is no way to know if now truly how to separate the ghost from within. So long ago its construction, upon faith and a matter of fact. Articles concentrated by a convention, signed by a builder, his cloak the color of black. This house has a foundation laid in the winter; its windows sealed by the night. What is one to say of this haunting, what is one to say of this errant decay? Can a house be a home really, when absolution of night rules the day? Failing the lack of an answer, the house will let phantasm take it away.

Oh, house that could be a mansion filled with light and magic within, on the eve of a great holiday glorious, how you sit there shrouded in din. How it is you, revel in stillness, pushing magic farther within. Forming union with all the legions, the darkest daemons of unconscious sin. Your inward walls collapsing in terror, your paint peeling within. For the lack of a coherent answer, the only sound is the noise of the northern wind. Did your blueprint not hold some passion, a design of song to begin? Was there never strength in your timbers to hold you up when the darkness began?

As I set here writing this missive, in the sunlight on a bright December day. Thinking how the dark words flowed so smoothly, I was shaken by what they relayed. An insight of a fool really, I am the house, and it is time for a change. I am the house, and it is time for a change.

Magnum mysterium phantasm is a spot in my mind, a haunted memory of pictures I cannot find. Darkness, darkness hello my old friend. A world floating with numbers, where does reason end. Houses for living, a house for the dead. Houses for living, a house for the dead. Houses for living…

There were angels dancing in shadows. There were angels darkened in shape. Singing magnum mysterium. Magnum mysterium. Awake! – 12.17.2020 – דָנִיֵּאל