Black Ice and Liquid Fire
by leah Sunday, Oct 11 2015, 8:47am
international / poetry / post

the billowing sails of dreams
starkly contrast the lead weight
of reality

a man sees a rose growing
on a ravaged planet
where little grows,
in his imaginings he sees spires of ice
reaching toward a sun blurred
by the aftermath of eruptions,
ash and the permanent dust of war,
black rain slowly extinguishes
the life that remains
‭
his mind tells him that no roses
are able to grow since the war
that ended‭ ‬everything,‭
extinguishing the abundant life that once
teamed in every airy,‭ ‬terrestrial,‭ ‬aquatic
domain

a poisoned planet cannot produce‭
a rose
yet the rose is real though the man’s
experience denies his sight
he sees ice where no ice is visible
and death where life struggles
to reassert itself

thousands of risings and settings
roll together to produce a permanent
twilight‭ ‬--
he is responsible for the war
he knows it now
he did nothing when malevolence
germinated
he watched‭ ‬while it spread like a plague,
he watched while others were slaughtered
imagining it couldn’t happen‭ ‬to him but plagues‭
know no boundaries or recognise foolish imaginings

his failure was not unique
but his survival a miracle or‭ ‬torture,
he remains alive to witness
the fruits of his inaction

bedevilled he screams,‭ ‬his sticky sweat
oozing through the filth on his body
as he stumbles toward the rose

delirious he tears the tiny rosebush‭
from the ground oblivious to its thorns
which pierce and tear his bloodied flesh,
he holds‭ ‬the bush‭ ‬aloft
howling like a demon

drowning in anguish a moment of clarity returns
to haunt him,
he sees the rosebush is real
and realises that he destroyed
the last remnant of beauty‭ ‬on
the earth