Stranded out at Sea

Door of oak, solid and fast.
Ceiling of paper, a paper mast
That holds the fan;
A flimsy plan.
Two candles burn,
Their flames in turn
Dance about and dart
Through an empty heart.
Echos smart my ears
Even as my peers
Evaporate from sight;
Such is my plight.
Pictures everywhere,
Silent converse their fare.
Books beside me, three shelves up...
A full stomach from sup.
Yet the mind goes zooming round.
Nowhere to be found
Am I to be, nowhere at all.
I listen everywhere for a call,
A simple sound, a voice...
One upon which to cast my choice.
A desk before me sits,
A computer holds my wits,
A phone counts down the time
Until the end of this morning rhyme...
Then music will cease,
Prayers begin.
My brow will then crease,
My soul within
Will sicken like a tree in autumn's wind,
Like an inn that's put out to much ale;
And having taken to much I'll end
With a sad sops mopping tale.
Dark surrounds me,
Dark within me,
Dark behind me,
Dark above me,
Dark to my left
Dark to my right,
Dark in the cleft,
Dark is my sight!
Where has my light gone?
Where am I, this pawn
Of one so great,
Where is the dawn?
Why doth my heart hate
The very waked sleep
That doth my eyes keep
From a softer bed?
What is in my head
That I should lay
Upon a floor of hay
That's grown sour after
So long in the rafter?
Or upon a marble floor
In front of an oaken door?
Curling lips do tell
That my mind is hell
To walk through tonight...
Like a frost or blight
To the greenery is I
Who do groan and sigh
With confused pain
Like down pouring rain!
And shall the door open?
Shall He return to me?
For right now I'm coping,
I'm stranded out at sea.

                Stranded out at Sea, (c) Luke Bennette