Now take my hand and hold it tight.
I will not fail you here tonight,
For failing you, I fail myself
And place my soul upon a shelf
In Hell’s library without light.
I will not fail you here tonight
***************************************
At the point where hope and reason part,
Lies the spot where madness gets a start.
Hope to make the world kinder and free –
But flowers of hope root in reality.
No peaceful bed exists for lamb and lion,
Unless on some world out beyond Orion.
Do not instruct the owls to spare the mice.
Owls acting as owls must is note a vice.
Storms do not respond to heartfelt pleas.
All the words of men can’t calm the seas.
Nature – always beneficent and cruel –
Won’t change for a wise man or a fool.
Mankind shares all nature’s imperfections,
Clearly visible to casual inspections.
Resisting betterment is the human trait.
The ideal of utopia is our tragic state.
***************************************
Winter that year was strange and gray.
The damp wind smelled of Apocalypse,
And morning skies had a peculiar way
Of slipping cat-quick into midnight
***************************************
