Winter
Written for “singspiration” / inspired by the noah & great flood story.
On top your timber fortress,
Can you hear the lullaby?
It surges above planks of oak,
Grabbing at your toes,
The flows of its melody will drag you down.
Can you close your eyes and imagine music pouring into your ears?
Ocean sobbing the song like an opera,
Millions of seashells rattle against your boat like a drum.
Is the music loud enough to drown out their last words,
Which swirl in your head, to the beats of their beating on your doors,
When they pleaded you to let them in.
Do you still feel guilty for shutting the door,
As the voices of your friends, neighbors, and enemies extinguished with a thud.
You rock back and forth to the lullaby
That put mankind to eternal sleep,
Who fought so hard to stay awake,
Kicking at their water beds and clammy covers,
Until fatigue’s fingers clutched their hearts
And shut their eyes,
So they could sink to sleep.
The ground is rumbling like a multitude of monsters, or just God clearing His throat, for a moment did you fancy that He was crying for humanity, when really
You are just as guilty
And maybe he’s spitting at the entire world for ruining his day
But at this point you don’t even remember what day looks like
The boards rumble from the thousands of animals below
Their restlessness
Shaking the timbers
Your family cowers in a corner,
They are searching for strength like
Scouring the ground for pebbles,
They are trying to crush their heads
With hands against their ears
To drown out the music from outside
You’ll watch your children hold their children
And rock them back and forth to the lullaby
And tell them to dream about home
The whites of their eyes will be the edges of the moon
The torch light shimmers on the scales of dinosaurs
shining diamonds on the rafters so they can pretend those are stars
The soft furs of mountain cats and bears will be their blankets
The birds the tapestries
And your wooden, make-shift world will breathe as every being breathes as every timber weaves as the giant boat heaves against the roar of waves and nightmares
When you gaze out the window,
Searching in vain for the horizon,
Knowing that the roiling ocean has swallowed the sun
What moisture trickles down your cheeks?
Relief? Now it’s finally over, the years of pivoting in greyness and ridicule is over, and there was a flood after all.
Or guilt, scared that the powerful creator of this apocalypse knew about your doubts,
Saw right through your thoughts as if they were mist,
When you imagined leaping over, because it would be all over,
If you fell into the waters’ welcoming arms
And let the lullaby rock you back and forth to the bottom of the ocean.
But this is the point of no return,
Your heart swells like the waves as they stretch out their arms to embrace your ship,
Breathe in seismic geysers, lightening, and apocalypse
Because even water-logged pages can still turn
It won’t take you an eternity
To realize that this is just another arc
To this story.
The endless author of the universe
Will rock you back and forth to his lullaby
In your wooden cradle
Letting you sleep peacefully
Until the sun breaks