Journey to Ixtlan

Poem - Pondering at the End

2019-12-23T01:50:04Z

The poem “Pondering at the End” was inspired by a photo that had a green CRT monitor repeating the phrase “what have you done?” for the length of the screen.

Pondering at the End

“What have you done?”
the ending sentence for a world
demanding answers never heard
when final doom was the last word

the echoes of the thunderclaps
reverberation of the dead
provides the tempo for the song
describing how things went wrong

heard by nobody of sound mind
or any mortals if truth be told
while this verity is on center stage
the audience is not there to clap

unless the ghosts are contrived
to be witnesses to the crime
what was done will always be
pondering at the end of reality.

© 2019. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20191222.

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Poem - Celebration

2016-11-23T13:48:49Z

A poetry challenge asked for a poem focusing on the final thoughts of someone who died in Pompeii. I took this on with a poem about a fateful birthday, the last for the inhabitant of the doomed town.

Last Celebration

Celebration hung in the air
perhaps the last for this one
replaced by ash drifting down
from sky's embrace of fiery doom
the sun had turned round again
in same place as my birth
now hidden behind the gloom
lost from sight by mountain plumes.

It seemed the gods had shown their grace
in comfort felt and wealth embraced
with incense offered in glad thanks
for blessings found until this day
now the soot mocks twisting pleas
from same incense pressed to ask
for the mercies none shall have
as benefits are turned to dust.

In this house I was born
cloistered rooms kept me warm
mighty walls to keep the wolf
at bay when moon was on the hook
no longer cover for the child
grown to nearly move along
to a place beyond safeguards
instead the ground will be my home.

The cheers are mute as ground rumbles
robbed from ear by blasting noise
happy wishes have fled from voice
to be replaced by mountain's roar
these last sounds were my world
as light retreated in front of fire
by lava's march to party's stop
this birthday party will be my last.

2016, Sean Green. All Rights Reserved, 20161123.

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Dark Ball of Ice

2014-07-05T16:57:45Z

Of propagandist doomsayers:

“Isn't it sad how some people's grasp on their lives is so precarious that they'll embrace any preposterous delusion rather than face an occasional bleak truth?”
– Calvin and Hobbes

This sounds terribly reasonable, until you know the context. Calvin thought the September weather was leading to the earth becoming a dark and lifeless ball of ice. His father told him that it's colder because the hemisphere is titled away from the sun. PHHHTTT. It is much more fun to believe the lifeless ball of ice theory, even if the consequences would be very dire if it were true.

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