(November News from the human realm)

November crests, and its dark wave (by Ken McKeon)

Closes out what’s left of the morning,
It draws light back
To its former haunts,

And my mind turns away from dawn’s clarity.
And the bells that rang out each bright birth,
Bringing joy each day to our light hearts,

Why they’ve been stilled for days now,
Fading ripples on a vast trembling sea,
And the stars are cloud enfolded,

They yield to us no signs, no tales
To look to and through as we
Try to fathom our own disbelief.

Confused, alone, bereft of comforting,
I wander, in the midst of my needs,
Off into the darkness I abhor,

I yield to its ways and enjoin its powers
To go ahead and accomplish what they can
In a world caught up in wildly tearing screams

Of those hunting and those hunted, both caught
Up in the roaring death bound streams
Of torn minds and rent bodies,

It’s quite a show, insane horror, accomplished
Heaven bound silken dawned wonderment,
And the iron bound sacrificial hold of hell.

I could watch it for years, even longer,
It’s what I’ve been secretly expecting all along,
And it’s finally here, soon to be playing out

On the screens nearest to me, my own two eyes,
And the screams will be voiced by me,
And within myself I pray to find the heart

To embrace it all, to know it deeply,
To be a sea, itself brimming with the tears shed
By each and all, and in pain’s plentitude

To find the key of pity, to resolve all hungers,
All needs, all ignorance and loss, it’s so
Beyond me, yet there may I find myself at last.

(a poem by Ken McKeon)