Terminus

Terminus

I heard the loud beating echoing through dim halls
The smell of dust, of lust
Stirred up with each breath
Filling my lungs
Blackening the throat
Painting through my body
With a jet-black brush
Like the mourning jewelry of old
Or the onyx eyes of a choking, frail bird

I heard the creaking of the bones
Grinding against each other
Powder forming at the joints
Mixing with the dust
Settling betwixt mountains and mountains
And piles and piles
Of bleached-white books
Basking in the sun
Losing words
Words slipping out
Slipping through cracks on the old wooden floors
Dripping through to the parlor
Where the old birdcage sat
And the glasses held dust
To be swirled, to be lifted
To the mouths of the passed
Of the past

I heard the ringing in my ears
Dredged from the silence that swam in the ancient air around me
Desperately crawling into my mind
Stumbling its way to the back of my skull
Finding an egress
To the rest of my body
Creaking, slinking down my gleaming-white cord
Chewing the bone
And spitting out shards
And stabbing, grabbing past vessels and lore
Surrounding my heart
Crawling into the chambers
And settling there
Drinking memories

I heard the pounding on the floor
An errant heart with no master
A dog with no whistle
A mind with no soul
Frantically swelling
Pressing against the white birdcage
Frenzied in its fight
Against years upon years
Upon days upon nights
Of the beating, still beating
Under blankets of dusk
And silence and dust
Grasping and gasping
Till pillars of rust
Surrounded it, crushing it
Beating no more
But silently waiting
Until the birdcage cracked open
And the sun came back in
And the pieces of dust danced in the rays of a once-beloved sun
And the cocktails of ashes upturned in their glasses
And the cracks underneath turned to lights up above
And the seas and the waves and the clouds
Began to move again

I heard
Nothing.