journey song #5:
in excelsis
On a dead night he met
"I have to stay." The words
Blind with longing, she reaches
She flaps in her own net, tears
And whispering from her, her breath
January 17, 1998
the white-winged woman,
shrouded and shuttered,
following her shadow in
the gloom of gaslight,
absorbed in her reflection
He showed her a way home;
she, moving her wings, sighed.
in her mouth, her vibrating
throat, the hands fluttering
uselessly. The intentions
shot away from her, ricocheted,
lost in the damp dark.
for him, meeting only air
and the rain and a whisper
that might have been a chance missed.
those snowy wings, draws water and
finally blood from her skin. Leaving
her wings behind, two enormous cups glowing,
she walks on, bleeding. But when she
calls that she is ready,
the same silence answers her:
there is nothing left. She has taken
too long. Her blood is useless,
the doors all barred against her.
demonstrates what it is to die human.
Live in pain, and die quiet; this
is the meaning of her tears, the stifled
need, the hope lighting nothing more
than stark buildings, wet streets.