The fragile photograph cracked and tortured— Forgotten in its box in the attic amidst A ponderous flood of memories The broken lines on her face, the years that have shuffled on And on through disgust and turmoil Spiders on the lips of its slow attrition Knives through eyes that have long since faded I remember this house like a half-forgotten song A name on the tip of the tongue A scar on the tip of the soul I listen to this demon as it crawls across the floor Drags itself across the boards and watches me Lifting up a voice that sounds like witches burning Scratching along the floorboards with a body gaunt and shattered I burned them all in effigy But must have forgotten about
This box covered in dust under the careful watch of dread Ghouls awash in the tattered finery of Hapless pain And withered in the trance Despair Disguised as agony Conjure forth the monster sleeping long in stony silence Roil the waves and rouse their denizen From an æon of splendid sleep left mercifully undisturbed Many arms about me, many Pulling me into the shape and shadow of oblivion Pulling me apart and gnawing without end And tell me: If the eyes of the dead are forced open— Even for a second— And the eyes of the dead are allowed to speak What is the hell they betray, and What is the nightmare unsealed? What has this fragment of Reason To do with the oceans of age?