Time Will Mend

1) You doubt my resolve? Very well, you shall
See just how much I am resolved to be
Removed from your reckless, pot ridden pal;
As removed as you: as you are from me.
A wedge was driven between us both in
A most unpleasant form: by loath talents
Each was shown to each other a norm; dim
Is the light of our respect for each. But since
You abhor my talents, and I do yours,
Then let us retreat to our private stores
Of knowledge and come not near the other.
Even though you be, sister; I your brother.
When differences define our long feud
Long will the land, by our hate, be imbued.

2) Care you at all for my woes or my griefs?
My sorrows? or my pains? Were I deceased
Upon the field of battle protecting
Many a man and woman, my King's fiefs,
I doubt you'd fret; for it was my belief
That you despised, my hope that you abhorred:
Yet as like to you am I, and I you.
This causes you distress, a living hoard
Of strengths, even weaknesses, will you rake
Unto yourself so as to compare us;
But in this, O, winter, thou shalt be dust
Before ever you shall find enough slake
In the differences which divide you
From me. This is my royal grantee.

3) Holding back, like the night, without much hope;
Can it be that you should be pushed to rope
Yourself round the neck with your difference?
Or is this apathy? Indifference?
Though you clutch the lever that holds you still
In place upon that mountain cliff, your will
Shall weaken in time: cause you to fall through
The sheet of ice that is your pain. Untrue
Are the lies that compose it's cold thin frame
That holds back your potential. In the vein
Of bitter rants you have often told me
That if you could not have it you would not be.
But I say that what divides us is to bless;
For when under such strain, more will be less.

4) You roll your eyes as you roll a stone, not
Interested at all in the progress I've
Made by arguments: you are staid; you've bought
The lie as though it were a truth, and played live
Soldiers as though they were uncouth soldiers.
Do not roll with ease the lives of these men
That come with love: a general does fear
To loose a single man; but one in ten
Is for you a small sacrifice. Yet roll
The white dice with the red for too long cher
And you shall soon be laid out in a full 
Suite; and I believe it will be quite bare
Of any fashion or design so to
Speak. A naked blade is the stone you brew.

5) Why the anger? Why the hate? I come back
To these questions, you retaliate, and
Hide your face as though the stars from the sun;
Such lesser beings in their glory undone
By the greater truth, the greater light seen,
Are no match: must retreat, their light they ween
Throughout the day from the darkness without.
For rivals are they with that fair sunlight
That causes them to flee and hide from sight
Their glorious sheen, their truth giving rays;
Yet for them our sun is the end of days.
So now I see why you hide. Why just route
Me before your anger and nighttime wrath?
Come into the light, let me see your staff.

6) But what am I? A fool. Just the kings fool.
You may laugh at me behind that fair mask,
You make half of me seem to be a tool
In the hands of my betters. Yet you ask
Me why it is that I have success, yes?
You cannot understand: you do confess
Yourself more the fool than I have been in
A time now long gone. What is this sin
That you and I share with the other one?
Is it but a trick of shadows and flame
Meant to hide the truth of what we've since done?
Is it but a cloak, our dagger, a name
By which we may hide our true felt desire?
Such secrets may end us both in the fire.

7) As light is from dark are you from my being;
But closer still than any other man,
Or woman for that fact, are you. For seeing
What is, and what has been in my life span
Of some twenty years, and more besides this,
You are able to know how each thing pans,
You know me even down to whom I kiss.
Yet as I said before, you understand
Not a single thing that I've done. I'd planned
That you might work with me, work side by side
With your brother; each of us then allied
Could make more of the world than we had done.
Thus it was with feeble hope's of friendship
That you betrayed me, and I you, with whip. 

8) Do you resent it after all of these years
Of living that you should rend yourself bare
Of any fruits, of hopes, forbear your tears
For the sake of bitter enmity? Wear
Caution my sister: the enemy does.
But your enemy is my friend because
Of a friendship we had long ago, not
Because my friendship causes you woe. Bought
Nothing have I from the woman you hate;
Though you have taught us now both to relate
With the other as though high treason were
Upon us. Yet it is simply not so.
Like the soft skin of an animals fur
Is the deception that neither will show.

9) Now hidden in the dark is a poison
That reeks of hideous powers, imbues
Upon the land, like our hate, a lotion
That feigns to be what it is not. A fuse
Box is but the chamber for many wires
That are housed within it's metal frame. Yet
If the box be made of permeable
Stuff, it shall against water soon tire.
Thus the masquerade that made us forget
That the chamber box must be seal-able
Is likened to the masquerade of our
Rivalry. As two vines do we act now;
Yet little do we know of what we are.
Thick darkness upon ourselves we endow.

10) Enemies have we become over what
You call enemy number one! A mere
Of water has become a vast lake, but
It still comes from the same stake. A mere tear
Is but a portion of what we have here
In this little room, this little chamber;
And out of it we would like to clamber.
Yet the lake of tears, of sorrows and woes,
Keeps us here standing even on tip toes.
Meanwhile our tear becomes a mountain weir,
And soon begins to broaden out it's shape;
The chamber overflows, and we are made
To float about without hope of escape!
Refusing to deal with what is inside
Allows the ocean deep to become wide.

11) In such a state of indifference you
Could write out a sonnet, poem, or two
Great songs that would sing out your olden grief;
Will you not seek to remove underneath
What I sense disturbs you, causes distrust
Amongst you and I? The armor may soon rust
If you do not get out of the rain storm
That is bearing down on you. Is it norm
That what is hidden inside be kept there
So that what was alive soon becomes bare?
Wherefore are your writings, your songs of woe!
But now I begin to see the problem.
My friend is your enemy because no
Words could you read or write when you were ten.

12) As a current rips apart travelers
Who fail to read the signs of winter's chill,
So too, do you, rip apart hopes to till,
In the early Spring, a crop of new cures.
As far to the right have I gone, in search
Of a melody that I may sing you;
As far to the left have you gone, to flee
My melodies, for you find them untrue.
The more I press you for my friends pardon
The more you press away from me, harden
Your heart. Yet the crack is always there for
Water to enter into the rock. Ice
Freezes even the hardest of stones, hoar
Frost becomes a weapon for a heart heist.

13) Yet as your heart is hardened, mine also
Is but a piece of sludge; a mushy one
At that, all cuddly and fat. You are done
With me not because of the battle throws
That you held with my friend, your enemy,
Rather because I was, like you, under
The impression that I was in life free
From foolish behaviors; and you, sister,
Were under delusions of grandeur, maid
Of honor where no honor now exists;
(Such honor lost by whom it was then staid)
Honor surrendered without fight of fists.
But who is perfect to judge the other?
Surely not sister, not even her brother.

14) The mantle we take upon our body
Is one that is fake, a window; haughty
Have we each become in our dim lit capes
Strung out below the crest of our own napes.
You take to wed a laughing horse of tricks
That cackles and coughs up lungfuls of ticks!
Yet descry my friend as full of deceit;
Not of words, but of looks. In your defeat
You go low enough to believe that she
Has nothing, superficiality 
Is the only thing that's going for her.
Well it's better, I'd say, of this I'm sure,
Than the cackling horse that's on your back.
So each of our mask capes gives us no slack.

15) Right is left, left is right, and in this war
We do not know what wright will not abhor
The creation we've made in the smithies
Of the Rocky Mountain, where the misty
Fogs do spread far and wide; this you do fear,
That we have allied in our anger for
The other to a greater power. Hear
Then that this is not our desired chore.
But already, it seems, that your words strike
Within me a cord of fear. For music
Will be what it is, left or right, the shrike
Will eat up anything untouched, the wick
Will not burn without the candle made wax.
And in fear now, I do fear for my pax.

16) A battle is won by soldiers, tis true
Enough; soldiers are hardier than I,
And I would not think to be one of you.
Who do without pause take the knife to men
If you suspect them of strife. You will die
For your fellow soldier, for your wife. Then
You would fight still in the outer rim: lie
In wait on whichever side you are in.
So now I consider, whose side am I
On? Whose side do you take? Yet even now,
As I consider anew how the rift
Between us began to unfold, the row
Which was our undoing, unwholesome lift,
I consider the outer rim anew...

17) Where have you passed by in logic of thought?
Why aren't you and I on the same white page?
Inside both of us are torn to little
Pieces: shrapnel overwhelms the senses,
Anger clouds judgement, hate bypasses love,
Rage instructs us attack without mercy!
Yet now I begin to wonder what cause
Could have made us forget the old ways, laws
By which we once solidified the sea
Of differences that now keep a doves
Distance between us. But the answer is
Not at all to my liking. The fiddle,
Though it play many a good tune, is sage
Only without hindrance. Now it is not.

18) What is time but a worn rag? and the rag
but resembling nothing more than a hag!
What is anger that it should boil over
In a great foam of bubbles? bubbles were
A thing that signified clean, where there was
Soap to be found! Yet we see that because
Of the heat of the water wherein set
Is the soap, pain is the first thing to bet
Primacy of touch. What a shame that this
Thing, set over the limit of it's good
Use, beyond it's purpose abused, this would
Be solution of cleansing for the worn
Rag of time, is no useless, is overborne
With the heat of rage, a victimized scorn.

19) You are but a worn rag, a would be thing
Of cleansing power that was so abused
By the heat of passion and the raging
Swing of seating fashion. I am confused
As to why you must boil over at my
Touch, why you must foam at the sight of me!
While I know that I too must appear, to
You, as a raging sea of boiling foam,
I cannot help but think us both alone
In our thoughts and unwilling to be true
To the other, to confess ourselves, see
The other for who they are; though we sight
To think of who we were, a polished rag,
We cannot undo now our timely sag.

20) Then what is the problem that holds us here
As enemies? enemies that will not
See the other for what they are, as clear
Sunlight upon the ground reveals the caught
Inhabitants that dwell in the dirty
Clearing, we will not see the other so!
Rather we see with the eyes of flirty
Expectation, a damnable fellow
That causes condemnation of the sort
That is eternal; a horrible wort.
The solution to your pot ridden pal
And my friend, who is your enemy now,
Is to live our lives as we would each day,
To live our gospel, to live our own way.

21) A car that collides with another on
The highway, or the street, through the salon
Window, collides with men and women, does
Not succeed in getting the right that was
Promised to it by the voice of command;
Yet so many act thus, they take a stand.
Can you force me to give up my old friend
Or I force you to forgo pot pals sight?
Perhaps somewhere around the future's bend
One of us will see in the other, might
Come to realize what it was they said;
And then they shall clear out of the old head
Of mothballs, and cotton two, all those old
Arguments of strife that had made love cold.

22) Sight undone is sight that has been won by
The enemy of all men and women.
His hands are now black, they were made thus when
He took quarrel with the question of why.
Why should a King, all robed, in such splendor
Of light that doth ring out, eternity,
Be wedded to that strange maternity
Of creation? It doesn't make sense! Wore
He his armor, but none of it mattered.
Bore no amour, he was a bit battered
By the sword of an angel, all in white;
Blinded forever, the dark became light.
If he needed this, I suspect we both too
Needed our own friends; mine me, and yours you.

23) Right is made wrong in the sight now undone,
Victory is loss that is never won.
To loose what we have without any gain,
Is like to throw us into a great pain.
Should I relinquish my friend without
Hope for another that's lying about?
Should you forgo that old pot ridden pal
Without a word from me? that I then shall
Be your guide in a world without her face,
In a new, possibly forsaken place?
Can anyone possibly hope to change
What is in the heart of another being
By insisting their way is best to sing?
Can they replace what they seek to now change?

25) The light of the dark is easy to see
When it's been your own cold reality.
Light outside the cave, in the daytime's ray,
Is harder to see through, keeps you at bay.
Can the dawn that brightens the sky's great frame
Come up all at once? Would it not be vain
For such a change to occur all at once?
You'd strike all men mad! They'd be made a dunce
By the blindness that strikes them, in their plight
They would run and hide, and they would requite
What you saw as an act of merciful
Ministry with cruel hate, and they would flee!
Thus I have gone all wrong in telling you;
What you should have done, I should do for you.

26) Slowly but surely the light comes out now,
But it comes not from the sun, or the sky.
Rather instead, you see, in your head, how
A star has descended and has drawn nigh.
In a dark place there is not much to see,
But it is not known, the reality
Is not seen by the inhabitants there.
You must come into the cave and lay bare
All that there is, which is nothing at all,
Not through words, but through living God's call!
A tree that blossoms, merely does it's task,
Is light in which others may want to bask.
But force is still the hand that forces us
To be enemies, and to have no trust.

27) Returned I have to my question you see,
What could cause us to be enemies so
Violent and bitter, in anger show
No love? The wit in the sting of a bee
Is that it's poison seems to be greatly
Exciting, enticing, it becomes you;
As any hurt first makes pain feel blue
And causes you to curse in vanity
It begins to seem normal like a tree
In the dead of winter over time does
Little to perplex us. We know what was
Will come again in time, and you shall see.
But what if we willingly made it such
That every day was always winters touch?

28) Who would help us along such a bad line
Of thoughts? who would string them into a whine
Of Naughts, Nay Sayings, and Horrible quips;
Who would take delight in making such rips?
Coal in the lungs, smog in the nostrils, and
Oil in the sand; these images of land
That are made unwholesome can become true:
Land is staid its growth by one who did woo
The nature of man in devious fashion.
This one turned all that was good in passion
Into dregs of what it all could have been;
This is the one, he who invented sin.
Yet even as he reaches to blot out
My mind, I still know what I am about.

29) He would keep you and I at fray of arms
That cause us always to make new alarms;
Of noise he is the master a bitter
Fellow who we hate, as is a sitter
Is he to a child. Now he reaches in
To my mind and also into yours too,
Tries to overcome what I know: this shrew
Thinks to erase revelations I've had
That I may continue in being sad.
His shell is cold, he is all made of tin;
I fear that his hand should cause me to feint
If he should but touch me, such is his taint.
But I focus instead on new found light,
This raises my stature to greater heights. 

30) Perhaps I am to blunt now in my speech
And you will not take from me the lesson
That I had hoped, with all of this, to teach.
Such is man, all stuck in his depression,
That he will not allow for the truth to
Sink into his head. For if he then drew
From the well of life, as I have now done,
He'd be done with his old life, and the fun
Which he coveted with his life being void
Would force him to let go of the steroids
He's been using, the girls he's been flirting
With, and even the guys he's been hurting.
But the point I've made, I came to slowly,
I came to it for you, my sister, see?

31) Yet all of this is unnecessary;
As the sun does not require of me
My rising in order for it to rise.
Though evil will often of us despise
The possibility of hope and love 
From the light of glory in heaven's glove
Lit hand, that it could reside our mind,
That we could respond to each other, kind
Words exchange, the past forget, put an
End to the last range of the bet, get tan
Skin from the sunlight and absorb it's sink
Of music, that bubbling water's link
To music, It cannot undo a look
Of understanding that you and I took.

34) Does a quarrel between oranges and pears,
Which are both fruit in case you're all wondering,
Have to catch us both at such unawares
That we must become bitter enemies?
As cold is to warmth, as heat is to chill?
Are these things not in fact connected to
The other in so much as they do brew
The conditions whereby the other exists?
As the boiling heat becomes the water
So that it may fill the dry air with mists
Of nourishment? The undying father
Created each thing as good, despite bad
Influence that causes us to be sad;
Yet in these things the farmer still doth till.

33) Suddenly the quarrel is gone like fruit
That came into season; the old owl's hoot
Becomes faint and then disappears as brown
Colored hues of night turn into the sound
Of yellow and orange that paints up the town:
So too did my anger towards your pot pal
Disappear, and your anger for my friend.
How does a look through the well of grief
Become the man or woman underneath?
Is it not better to see through the weight
Of sorrow and grief and in such time state
What harrowing pains are on our own souls?
So we might override all our controls?
So in a look we begin, we intend.

34) Over days we think to first speak of hurts
That were inflicted upon us by each one;
Yet when weeks become our brows the deserts
Of our thoughts begin to fade, are undone.
The months turn such things into childish dreams
That unravel, come apart at the seams.
Years begin to hold a sway over us
So that we begin to fail in our old trust;
For the look wherein we understood each
Other became a look of longing, reach
Of desire to speak out our heart's own guilt:
Yet we are still stuck at the very hilt,
Stop at fear, and a decade is gone now.
Still we meet each other, politely bow.

35) Then after a decade we speak again;
And time seems to, our friendship, give us both
A new sense of unity. We see growth
Seeping underneath the skin of our thoughts,
And think to ourselves perhaps now the cost
Of silence, of patience, of endurance,
Has actually saved us from the woes made;
When I was a boy and you were a maid.
The blink of mine eyes seem to have erased
The memory of hatred and anger. You
Too seem to see the change, you have surfaced
From the deep cold, the dungeon that held two
Of us for so long within the confines
Of our own selfish thoughts; our whines are wine.

36) My resolve to hate you has dimmed, in flight
Over mountains and golden hills, the world
Seen over and over again has slight
Consequences upon what I have hurled
Into your face years before; insults had
More impact when we were younger, and now
We seem to have lost some of that umph. Bad
Thoughts seemed the greater, the stronger, and how
They seemed more glorious still when we were
On the breach of time! When we entered through
That wall, that breach made by rhymes so untrue;
For little of the truth made it into
My thoughts, my great undying love for you.
Now sister, we lay it all aside, pride
Has no hold over us. We are allied.

                              Time Will Mend, (c) Luke Bennette, May 2012