The Ides of February/4th Iteration

February 17th, 2023/4th Iteration

In Memory of Floyd Russell Taylor.

As dawn clarified itself into morning light,
Then, as afternoon yawned within evening’s sight,
With finality, my husband closed his eyes
On the oblivious and chaotic earth of the ruined,
Wailing under the runes of misfortune.
It was the ides of his death, when the poorer poets
sing the cliche
Of being borne to an everlasting shore to dance
among the immortals.
Orotund Oratory aside, in truth, Heaven was mere justice
For his having kept the faith with me, his very own
harebrained poet.
I’ve gone mute beneath the ticking seconds of the clock,
Growing ever so slowly old and diminished.
Speechless, thus, utterly humbled, at last I can listen
With the antennae of a hare’s most sensitive ear.
Through a static of the other side’s dimension, I still could clearly hear
The grace notes of my husband’s soul,
Now, a song that was suddenly embellished by the
inspired notes of a Genius.
Who was the Genius singing his music?
I remembered,
Once, I too could sing.

All who are born on this day of the 17th, in the month of February,
Let us not cross paths just to suffer the very sight of each other
From some slight or another, ad nauseam.
Instead, as if it were the honor of a mission bestowed
By the constellation ruling our birth,
Let us rise to each occasion of another’s pain, not ours,
Whenever in our ear we hear a keening voice so clear and near.
So human, that meld of all such voices, if faceless, though faithless.
May the synthesis that is its pitch become the prelude
To songs from all of you to me, from me to you, ad infinitum.
Our hopes for humanity could be the very grace notes of our souls.  
Some Genius will divine these,
Intertwine them with an overarching melody of love, a dance of fanciful footwork
That inexplicably draws us together for a mysterious and godlike end.
Until She, He raises their mask and we salute, the die be cast.  Acknowledge, bow.
Clasp and shake hands on this, all of you and me:
May we die as one of them,
So plebeian, so emblematically all too human.
Worthy, we will be blessed, a star in the constellation ruling our death.
We forged the runes of resurrection and gave them away with extravagance.

Men and women should not run for cover with the alacrity of hares,
But breathe the air of their tomorrows, dare to smile, then Dare.