One day a frog was sitting on a log and a scorpion came by and asked the frog to carry him across the pond. "But you will sting me and I will die!" said the frog. "I promise I will not!" pleaded the scorpion. So the frog let the scorpion on his back and began to swim across the pond. Half-way across, the frog felt the scorpion's sting. The frog, gasping as the poison took, said to the scorpion, "You promised you would not sting me, now I will die and you are fated to drown. How could you?" The scorpion replied, "It is my nature."

Recently I ended a long distance relationship. And though that relationship had nothing in common with the one that the following poems were written for, I discovered that they all applied. That does not lesson either of the experiences but attests to the universal nature of love and its affect on our hearts. No lover is better than another. Just different.

Odysseus's Rage

By my hand Troy was freed,
It was I riding the hollowed wooden
Horse that slaughtered a sleeping kingdom.

Trapped in darkest cave by giant one eyed-beast
I do not rest content to be the fodder of someone else's appetite,
My freedom's desire burns my way to open ground.

Bound to my mast holding strong my course
I have passed the deadly Sirens' Songs
And ended those witches' allurement of mere mortal hearts.

Though I fall asleep at my ship's helm and the tempests rage
They blow my vessel from my approaching homeland
I cry to the heavens for a return to you.

I would cheat the gods their due, to rest within your domestic felicity
I would summon the cleverest words spoken on these hallowed grounds
To woo you back to this heart's battle.

What a sad vexation to choose a long life
Of passionless obscurity and retirement over
A fraction of same spent in blazing glory.

The question needs no answer for it is predestined.
Our hearts cannot escape
The new fortune placed before them.
The flame must burn its full life span,
Attempt to overt your eyes from your heart's hunger
And risk forever blindness to your soul's passion.

The Pantheon Cannot Crumble

I asked you to sit with me
Be a god upon a throne.

In your eyes I see the heavens expanse double.
You run in fear afraid of the unknown.

How could you deserve such a seat?
How dare you to attempt such lofty ambition?
Since your birth a veil of deceit
Has settled over your eyes
Cheating you of your right sight.

Your's is a journey of greater surety.
A confidence of steps yet to be taken

I ask you to sit WITH me.

Take your rightful place Apollo.

Reasonable Hand-drawn Facsimile

Ah the many lips I've kissed full or thin,
soft or firm flesh pink;
possible pathways to dissipate loneliness.

Ah the many eyes in which I have gazed,
brown, green, blue orbs;
corporeal crystal balls to glimpse a possible future

Ah the many locks of hair these hands have run through,
black, brown, blond strands of desire,
connections to my hearts plea for release.

Ah the many bodies my flesh has pressed,
soft and firm, supple warm, hard and wet,
incarnations animal yearning for completion.

Ah the many parts of passion,
connecting in moments of breathless wonder.
Hours spent in little death's arms,
attempting to capture a life's full promise.

All folly's vain attempt to reconstruct
your lips, your hair, eyes and body,
to play false parts in my passion play
that even crucifixion cannot transform.

At day's death
I find myself reliving
Moments of triumph
And tragedy (of my own hand's scripting)

My awareness examine done in fair faith.
The good recalled and gratefully given praise.
The bad forced forward for atonement.
The track traced for a tomorrow filled with future fame.

All complete,
One thing remains,
My nightly prayer,
The mantra of your name.

In a restaurant I sit,
writing yet another dirge to love forsaken.

Across a table a promise sits.
All lean and taunt waiting with a cat's spring.
Full with potential passion and pleasant bearing.
Mine is not the only head his continence turns.
But mine his gaze returned.

Sex on his sleeve inviting.
All angles carved by some maestros hand.
Pointed nose, square jaw, red lips, black eyes.
A busted beacon calling me to desires end.

Is he the one to wean this wistful heart?
Is it here a new journey may find first foot?

Now if only he was you.

Ah the exquisite pain of your memory
shrouding my faint heart.

How I pine the days,
delightedly hoping for any slight sign,
that your day was interrupted,
with a passing thought,
to some distant exchange.

Maybe not my name nor even my face,
but maybe a certain wind or smell,
or just some ethereal unknown
that causes your foot to pause for a brief second,
you stop,
trying to decipher the paces slowing.

It might have been me?

Oh how I languish in this four chambered prison,
though the chains have been broken.
Call the jailer! Shackle me once more!

Cursed to the desert,
I wander over dunes.
No sight fixed on a horizon,
No oasis prayed for.
Each sand grain trod upon with delight.
Each a piercing echo of your name.
Singing a cacophony,
My soul's song.

Ah sweet exile!
Trapped in your memory my heat is forever home.

You did not give me anything my hands had not already held.
You did not say anything my ears had not already heard.
You did not show me anything my eyes had not already seen.
You did not touch me anywhere I had not already felt a caress.
You did not stir anything that has not already been moved.

I search for your contribution I cannot count.

So then why do I feel I have lost the treasure of a king?

My eyes see colours that were once not there.

My ears hear sounds that were never so clear.

My tongue tastes flavours that use to be bland.

My nose smells scents that flowers can't command.

My skin feels sensations that bombard and confuse.

Tell me sweet fairy what toxins did you use?

Chasing some uncatchable star.
Clinging to a hope that may never be fulfilled.
See!! You used the word may.

Preposterously you pursue,
What you do not have.
Onward Sisyphus your rock awaits.

Keep fooling yourself with delusions,
Of some cosmic god granting your mortal wish,
For release from the torture your hand inflicted.

How pathetic.

Oh how you woo me with your portal fragrance.
Luring me forward through a gate of no return.

Your name,
my love and desires expression complete.

What fever you inspire,
Burning my flesh from my frame,
Exposing my soul to its true identity.

Your embrace consumes my hearts longing,
Trapped within the slow decay of time.

Carrion come.
I abandon all to thee,
for lost affection diminishes all other purposes,
save the want of your touch.

Heart Pirate

you are the ship of forever bounty,
sailing between my want and need
I beg you to drop anchor.

but alas you sail on
with but a melancholy wave
in some vague direction
your compass predestined
not to stop at my bearings

I remain on my treasured shore
imprisoned with your memory.
And not even good fortune's blade
can cut me loose from the manacles of sorrow.

I have not the strength to gaze upon the horizon.
I dare not invite another vessel to take your place,
For the water broken, can never be reformed as it once was.

And yet I dare not throw myself into the frigid depths to end
this bleak night.
For then your bitter sweet memory would be erased.
Leaving nothing.

I wish it was some rogues blade flung,
Or gun trigger pulled,
Or some raging weather systems clashing,
Or natural unseen disaster passing,
Or some freak accident with a household appliance,
Or a car recklessly steered over a cliff,
Or some rare disease that infected your frame,
Or...

But alas it was none of these that took you from me.
Nothing easy to accept like the turning of a knife.
For it was but the turning of a phrase - "I can't do this."

First in line for your affections?
I was not.

Your happiness first to fulfill?
I was not.

The ability to promise all the same?
I cannot.

To offer a guarantee for life?
I cannot.

To take away all your pain?
I could not.

To promise not to cause you that pain?
I could not.

Ask you to blindly follow?
I will not.

Ask you to lead?
I will not.

Try to daily love?
I will.

Try to daily inspire?
I can.

Try to daily challenge?
I could.

Walk along side you?
I will.

He sits next to me.

His teeth crooked with decay,
He smiles at me shamelessly,
Exposing the barbed enamel.
His breath passes over the rot,
Attacking my flared nostrils.
I pretended to sneeze to cover my nose.

His hair matted from days of un-wash,
Grass and grime cling to each follicle .
In laughter his head bobs and it grazes my face.
I pretend to scratch to wipe away the offence.

His hands gnarled and bruised.
Skin bloodies and torn from gray-brown nails.
He extends his hand to shake.
I pretend to drop my book to escape the touch.

He rings the bell and descends the steps,
Turns with a big grin and a wave for me.
I turn to the person across and answer a question unasked.

I ring the bell and descend the steps.
I touch the handle he last felt.
As I feel his dirt I think to myself,
How fortunate he is.

His decay is of the body,
Mine is of the soul.

So friendly you entered,
All charm and chuckles,
Gained my trust,
Opened me up,
with your reticent smile.

Then you took my heart,
While I was at play,
In your field unaware,
Of loves deception.

You offer no note,
Of ransom to pay,
For the return,
Of my frightened child.

I fear this crime go unsolved and

I will be missing forever.

I no better a god than he.
He no worse a demon than I.
We are but two spirits,
In quest of you.

But what deity blessed such rancid platitude
First come first served.
Denying me victor's laurels,
Cursing me to second.
Which in this two man race means
I lose.

What heavens demand rearranging,
For you to see that just maybe
First path is not always last path?
Damn your martyrdom to Hades' fires.
What treacherous disciple of love gouged your eyes,
Leaving you blindly following
A faith no longer valid?

Goodbye to a Lover