Alas

“Alas”

Forgive me, Father, for my sin.
I’ve come to speak of Heaven.
My tears will speak through me,
As my demons seek to undo me
In the sigh of paradise that awaits—
But this is not my fate

In the desert land of pain
I sought to find myself again.
Under suns that dried up all my tears,
I wandered lonely through my dying years
But in the sand saw neither shade nor sign
Of any soul that might have been mine.

You knew that I had gone away,
To where? Alas! I cannot say.
Beyond the words you tried to speak
Past the promises you had hoped to keep
But from the cradle to the grave, they followed not
Alas! Alas! They were all I sought.

And in the desert, formed a sea.
Of silent shades that beckoned me.
Ghosts that told me of the songs they sing
In the silence that their music brings.
And my tears fell from the sky as blood
Upon the echoes of the voices I loved.

And these specters in their horror
Beckoned me upon the shore.
And their words that only I discerned
As my spirit within me burned
Spoke of a shadow that falls like the night,
And there came to my sight
The black veil of this long farewell
To speak of Heaven while I reside in Hell.

© 2022 Marten Hoyle