I am the Wedge

all fall down

I am the Wedge

Basaltic fellow! Quit thee now thine ominous scowl!

Nay.

Bridge that light that bridges all. Art thou game?

Nay! Peace…

What peace!

From sleep’s blue rictus shaken, taken;

wakened naked, supine.

Art thou then primed?

I am quiescent.

Opine!

Nay, render me mine. Cross the line and be damned or divine.

But render me mine.

We are in parley! We must sign.

Receive us! Proclaim us One!

You are riven.

So? Thou art…many? Expound!

I am the wedge.

I have tallied charge and challenge,

have mapped the woes of war.

And I tell you now: from gravel are you sired,

to gravel are you bound.

Regard your bridges: Worms--

Sss!

scoundrels--

Sss!

bigots, charlatans, thieves.

Ssssss! Ssssss! Ssssss!

Eloquence without sinew, ethos without spine.

Born, bought, and bartered. Yes, you, and you--

All of you were privy to Design.

Then…thou art partisan?

I have no side.

O cleaver of dreams!

I am he.

Defiler of man!

Not so. I am the wedge.

Then name thy station.

I am he who severed One: soldier’s specter, specter’s son.

Long had I pondered: Dominion? Free Rein?

Sapience failed me. Wonderment won--

I fostered discussion…a quizzical vein…

opinions, religions…damn all meddling--

now mankind is twain.

So blame thy daring! ’Tis conflict thou wreak.

Such is compulsion: a vision, a venture…now brutes on the loose,

of tenderness sparing, of hubris profuse.

That you, in your fervor of treaties should speak…

I beg you consider your contract undone;

dust and distrust wait this union you seek:

warfare, I verse you, proves truer than truce.

Our company kneels, fealty their shrine!

Your zealots delude you, prostrate or supine.

Such rogues die a thousand deaths, yet remain in arrears.

May their live corpses lie a low while longer.

Sweet coma, black drug, altercation and wine…

be leery, I say--there are tines in the years.

Now, “allies”, behold! Your Pale Master nears.

Blasphemer!

I am he.

Vigilante!

Vengeance is poetry. Vigilance is mine.

Thou art…Conscience! Comeuppance!

I am he. I am teacher and truther:

I am seer and sounder and all you allege.

Comeuppance, indeed.

I am the wedge. All must labor and love with accountability:

Those who menace the frail shall burn.

Sss!

Those who lie with same shall burn.

Sssss!

Do not manifest spirits, nor flatter the beast,

nor lean to the trove, nor coddle the lorn.

They are soulless. They are anchored to morn.

It is not death, nor darkness,

nor dearth of wit I spurn--

it is soullessness I scorn.

Acquit us of sin! We are led from behind!

Then heel, say I, and heed:

That one egg might bind, all sons must bleed.

Womb and grave lie equidistant.

Murder, madness, sorrow, sickness,

solitude are seed. I am neither, I am none;

Sign and recede. Take up with yon worms.

Scrawl down your terms and be done.

O Life!

Hypocrites.

Ah Love!

Hypocrites!

Peace! Peace!

Hypocrites all! Gather your skirts and run.

Save us, then! Advise us!

Save? Would you cling to the light, hurling despair upon despair,

hurtling ever downward, to be smashed outright; still crawling:

broken creatures clawing, drowning gutless, heartless;

living without learning--only to feign "born anew"?

Assassin!

Your logic is perversion. Have the greatness to be mute,

suffering seaward, to that brave expanse where all salts are borne.

But, surely…we are misguided!

Those sins you embrace, that Soul you eschew--

the same tide shall return for you: disheveled, forlorn,

into the ravening tempest torn; a million billion testaments--

Defrauder!

Am I? Critics, order your view. Your creed is flawed.

Consider: electric priests beseeching,

rogues and tramps outreaching.

Wretches in fashion, sages in slumber,

too vapid to measure, too varied to number.

Sing: Plagiarist, poser, gossiper, mime,

writhing in rhythm, twitching in time.

Flatterer, lecher, trafficker, fraud--

Wayfarers? Nay: leeches ripe for leeching.

I am the wedge. Neither hawk nor dove,

not harbinger, agent, ogre, or god.

To the vortex, then, from one whose essence waives assimilation.

Counsel! Wouldst thou leave us merely fly?

I am the wedge.

Sweet Verity grounds me…

how she steadies my aim,

how she tempers my edge.

Divinities, nod! Make rightful our shame!

Your faux idols rue you.

There is black, and there is white.

Between extremes, a gray divide

bleeds ever left and ever right.

Where leaps of faith and thought collide,

mortal man confronts his summing:

He is nugatory…he is nothing…

he is one instant extant, one atom wide.

Absorb us, then…redeem us!

Bah! The herd is your calling.

The pattern runs through you.

Season to season, your cant rings afresh:

Prayer marks your passing, prayer your becoming.

Submit, then, sirs! Be still. Your treaties mean nil.

Recline your selves. Lie firm.

Consign your hopes, your fears, your years,

your flesh unto the Worm.

In candle and casket, may naivete renew you.

Humility brings wisdom…arrogance, the ledge.

Peace be unto you,

I am the wedge.