Soliloquy

By

George O. Obikoya

Even with little left to call my own,

And the sun begs the poltergeist’s soul;

That naught stops my dream of primal sleep,

An evening rose cries to herald me home.

As its sacred tears caress my tired soul,                                                    

That an eternal trip stays for now on hold,

Roams a mind that seems no longer my home;

An awesome sleep tinged with brewing gloom;

A timeless waltz with dread my soul rebinds,

Inside; a Horner filled with sanguine breast.

In ageless recluse Eosian breath craves,

A beleaguered soul lost in corporeal faith,

To revel in transience so blessed with love,

That pain of endless dread will not erase;

And eagles bear on the wings of my soul,

Always with hope in a sacred rebirth;

That it may rejoice in spectral planes,

Of love, where souls frolic in manic craze;

Free from solitude in a depthless crypt.

My soul roves unbound nested in a spell;

Adrift in time on sundry mystic planes,

Sacred crypts that echo varied songs;

To celebrate life in consummate peace; 

Not enshrine an angst that beckons still;

Pain that not even my penance reliefs:

That torments my soul to bleed tears;

Where minors die that some make a buck;

To bore coded recess to maim and kill;

And water; in foul brooks it now must flow.   

To ask that my desire tempers is vain;

On a plane where life ever seems to fade,

In minds not attuned to its shameful ways;

Its decay that my soul no more beholds;

It’s faux: the color of life that mind defies;

A rainbow of tentative hues and forms;

The very mimesis my soul seeks to gain,

To be close to my being as it could be;

And linger on with prayers for the dead,

So my purge nulls the slips of netted souls.  

To flaws in nothingness my soul admits:

The guilt for bounties beclouds my dream.

My eyes adore its pristine chiffon veneer;

The gift of life to bless a forlorn being;

Tonic to soothe my dry yet tender lips;

That truth beauty sires is from deep within,

And save my soul caged aboard a mystic trip;

Laden with seamy mosaic of my elfin days;

Vanity that my spirit shuns yet craves,

That my eternal voyage starts at last.

But for now my heart longs here to stay,

While my soul rummages in infinite space.

As the roses spread in mystic embrace,

That priceless relief that flows within;

That shears the dusk of need, cry; grieve;

And fills endless burrows with time to live;

To relish gems locked in nature’s trove;

Where my heart ventures, as hope evades,

And pain and sorrow belie my smile;

Their songs stir my soul to fete with love.

Yet, my all seeks solace in celestial grace,

As even sleep lends fear no blind cloak; 

Faith braids hope for tears to lace my eyes;

To rouse my spirit and free it from pain;

So, my soul may tarry but not in vain.

Interred in life’s morbid streets of shame,

Perplexed, displeased, and utterly stressed;

With little to lose to venture in mystic veil;

And hope hides in memories in my face;

The skies are ready to welcome me home.

If life was a lasting voyage into light;

The perfect harmony to which all aspire,

As our heavenly friends watch awe-struck;

To see earthlings strive in a penal void,

That my soul wagers then would be plain,

As hope shines even in the darkest plane.

But wither hope for the lame it handicaps;

The baby, fresh alive, snatched in its crib;

Its mother that pays to bear another face;

And my soul that has to wait in vain?

That it waits torments my weary eyes,

Which see, so much hurt buried inside;

Deep within the crucible where all start;

Where, life even as quixotic also heads.

Maybe, they see too why never to weep;

Or swallow any more anguished gaze;

Of souls that inescapably join my own,

To lament confined in an eternal cage;

To mold and thaw forever in cyclic pain.

Players: in an endless cosmic game.  

And so my soul craves to vary the game.

But why it lacks the will for now to stay,

Its expiation in solitude makes plain.

As it must faze even the tardiest mate,

To see the sublime play on sundry planes,

Not strife, war, terror, drought, famine; pain;

And odious lore handed down in sly codes,

For generations yet unborn to venerate;

The spectacle of shame in countless shades;

Only in cosmic rebirth my soul can change.

Now, that freedom shelter’s my pitiful soul;

That it may roam in bliss in primal states;

Gaily with grace asleep or wide awake,

In the vastness of space that time unbound,

An ode, on roses shadows my itinerant soul.

Come fly with me in the air now my home:

Let us serenade with the roses again;

Their songs of hope do not confound;

That love may reign always in our hearts,

Even in the transience life bestows.

In time, with faith in hope life will reign,

And ease my soul of angst its own way,

To make the void of life easier to fill;

With love to enjoy its bounties in full,

So children burgeon, not laden with pain;

And for all, life is nature’s gift to praise,

That our souls may then return to base;

And muster the collective will to change,

A life plagued with misery, dread, and pain;

Not locked in transit in the void of space,

Free to roam its nullity for ever in peace.