On Beauty III

By

George O. Obikoya

Truth in beauty like soft lava flows in my mind:

pours in sheets like love forever from the heart;

a virgin stream from the sanctified grate within  

navigating pristine cobbles, exuding warmth;

to soothe my soul it prays the deities, release;

that Grace may forever with compassion view

my mind ensnared in the void beauty eludes;

my weary eyes that strive to feed me the truth

even in my dreams that often portend my day;

that divine pity shines on me to end my gloom.

Yet truth belies the wisdom innate to my being;

to tell sense from reason that the void resists;

lechery from loneliness of a smitten heart;

when wiliness poses as truth hidden in love;

beauty crafted with fervor and masterly skill;

in the satin sheen of cute kittens stroked in oil,

caressed by museum caliber canvass lights;

pretty as with which nature endows my eyes;

delightfully offered my mind as sainted truth;

guile in the void veiled with adorable grace.

And my fancies that will ever with me remain;

my whims rooted in faith that conjure; also mull

barnacle geese roaming free the northern skies;

goslings fresh off the cliff that fill the arctic fox;

the phantasmagoria of chthonian elves;

the laudable quest of the masterminds of math;

the mimesis of truth my mind contrite, contrives;

dreams, with flawless faith in existential rebirth,

in the void that truth may reveal godly grace;

my phantasmal triad: my cosmic fairyland.

That reason only homes me on the sacred truth;

none else assures my senses a more perfect view;

to relish the dance of the buzzing potter bee;

the glory of its mud mansion perched on a leaf;

the marvel of masonry of a lonely bug;

the midnight mermaid, her chiffon wet with my tears;

in whose eyes love flows to save my pitiful soul;

that says to me: “Stay. It’s going to be okay!”

fills me with spirit and vigor that hope prevails;

reason, enormous humility not conceit.

Truth is a veritable token of the pledge

the gods reveal to purge agony in the void;

nestled in beauty; a sanctuary of yore;

as it must wager to shelter a soul by choice

forever blind to truth in the void it shines;

to a mother’s grief over a valiant youth

slain in battle, a hero to the very end;

oblivious to the promise of a dear life sold;

the fury of the gods so utterly perturbed;

as betrayal, trades truth for death in the void.

As my hope for spiritual rebirth fades away;

my face, wizened by the eternal gaze of shame;

the true sparrow now croons a grueling ode;

drained assuaging my passion to no avail;

this cute minstrel, a banjo it no longer has,

gone eternally, its wings now so limp and lame;

my voice lost in the babel of wails and groans,

snared in the void, fritters away holy truth; 

salvation, my soul now in limbo sorely craves, 

if, not hopelessly scared, by mesmerizing lies.

Wither my soul that toils in a grazing blaze?

with chicanery in vogue and nowhere to hide;

vultures on a diet of mobile carrions;

and eagles order truths with evangelic zeal;

the vigil over me backed with menacing beaks;

beauty disguised to ensure my mind succumbs

to silly maneuverings in an ageless crypt:

a fraudulent parody that the gods disdain;

manifest in beauty that sundry artists craft;

ballyhooed with ardor as everlasting; truth.

To roam in a seamless abyss is not my fate;

to rejoice in a mask of twisted truths, inane;

and with the ghost of the truth ever on my trail;

to see me partake in the covenant with faith;

that, phantoms inhabit my mind it now rejects;

ready to relish the truth it pledges to extol;

to abhor the treachery to canonize lies;

embrace beauty as the bearer of truth, divine;

that it may know its tinges to tell them apart;

and with other souls, cultivate the good of all.

For on my mind my soul inevitably thrives;

it hurts that rudderless my guiding angel floats;

distressed, farther away from a pitiful being;

to watch its image on an earthly plane decay;

left behind in an archetypal cosmic game;

to rot in a void not be free to rejoice 

with seraphim and cherubim in godly truth;

beauty revealed to all in its glorious shades;

that, like children on a timeless merry-go-round;

my mind and soul swing as one forever again.

Truth and beauty, like my mind and my soul, are one;

and like feuding sibs, at times foes but not for long;

adrift in a void, my mind; faith in my eyes;

will find my soul; secure on its powerful wings

the albatross flies us home, to a certain fate;

unite with the divine spirit or wilt away;

why my mind and eyes must no longer be vain;

and create truths whose beauty will in time decay;

but be firm in my faith to assure my station

rimes: with truth, and beauty on the awareness chain.