Until I am to be Freed

I worked in my master's lands until he passed
His family then sold their land and each slave
My wife and child were bought and sold again
My healthy looking body led me to new fields
Chosen as a gladiator, they said I had promise
All 20 years in fields had left my body muscled
I had never been a warrior, but I could look it
I've scars from work, muscles built from labor
I've fought exhaustion, but not fought humans
Due to a mind ready to learn and my maturity
My earliest gladiatorial fights less a challenge
As they were contests of human lives, conflict
I endured the early tests, and developed skills
I could fight well, but I would not boast of it
Time spent training, were not to be champion
They were to survive and given my freedom
From there I'll trace my family and free them
I must win my next contest, then know more
Until then I train, I pray, I rest, begin again
If the Gods approve, I will be victorious
But the one I slay will also be out of pain
And now I do not suggest I deserve to win
For all of the others believe they'll win
Not from some hubris found within him
The desperate hope against catastrophe
To be allowed to exist, with no master

Sophia

Beautiful and gentle, slightly afraid of her own shadow
Loving and so soft, well beloved, ready to wear her halo
Uncomplicated, if confused, able to find her way home
She's moved beyond the material realm, waits in heaven
I miss her, forever, my life was made more by her being

Time in Oblivion

I needed faith, needed a guarantee
To design a living, organic being
I can't even live the life I have
Makes me wonder the point of it
My brain tells stories every sleep
I dream and reach for more within
Watching my body fail, as I grieve 
In fathoms deep, lost in the dark
I am bleeding, covered in scars
I live my life silently screaming
Hoping I disappear into nothing
Oblivion, a punishment to some
Not to me

When Ancestors Died

In the thick grass, footsteps crash through the waves
Where the wheat is golden in color and reflects the sun
Looking on the land in astonishment and in reflection
Searching the ground, I am seeking artifacts of battle
It is here, at Canae, the greatest slaughter happened 
Hannibal cut through Romans, as a scythe through grain

To transcend our limits

In every day that breaks, we believe our destiny is now
In this city, we plant the seeds of our legacies, the dream
Ascendant lives we see families rise above sacred ground
For every father and mother there's a child of knowledge
And a world that will become fulfilled, stands on edge
In time it is surely true, my dreams will never relent
In ascension, I'll have reach passed the heights
Revealing the ceiling of our planet Earth 

Without War, Where would we be?

Humanity yet lives, still and forever more, in the shadows of war
The death of innocents will never stop, violence will continue
A bitter truth, humans will kill other humans, unto extinction
Life's a miracle, death's a curse, but it seems, humans hate life
We make up for the slaughter, with memorials and holidays

Every weapon we build, is a tool or investment that we cannot make
Every choice to use violence is a lie, a disguise to hide shame
Some live to serve others, and others live to kill others cold
When the day is over, and the dead have all been counted
We are alive in a horror story constantly told

Why do we fail so often? Perhaps we've made a choice, when challenged, we fight
We live in a world where war is considered the legitimate choice
But lives are thrown away, and for what, protestors and noise?

 

Finding Paradise

Together into the nethers, then to the hereafter
We'll hold hands, knowing even if life isn't fair
Face in the same direction, we see things same
Past is gone, the future is the next generation's
If it is now that Heaven holds us, without pain
We have only one moment, it will last forever
We'll stand for the One whose called our name
Freed from love's starvation, life's alienation

Blood covered and still gentle

I heard a powerful, distinct voice, calling me from death
A savior, covered in blood by my hand, the spotless lamb
Calling my name, saying it was time to live, lit my flame
An end would not be the end, I don't own my final breath

In Orbit

Floating above the surface of earth
I looked upon the deep blue world
Glorious, with green life abundant
A planetary source of life, purpose
I'd cried gently, the earth observed
Dust turned living clay, triumphant
Life giving new life, life giving birth

In the Darkness

Light is our power, darkness is an emptiness
Fire burns darkness, patience destroys hours
While captured in a void, there's no way out?
We wander so blind as do simple humanoids
The world we wish to have is far from reach
Should we create different worlds or change?
The path unknowable, or one we cannot seek

Two Black Swans in a world of White

The world thought us odd, and we were surely that
But to be different than the many, a wonderful fact
We have never lived upon their terms for our being
Nor will we live upon their praise to be farseeing
So a world sees us as different, a praise always
We are two black swans among a flock of white
Two black swans in a great world of others
We simply desire to be one with another
And so we find ourselves where we are
Alone in world, connected at the heart

I am wounded, my love is lost

My love, my sweet Cymoril, princess
We grew up together, always in love
No moment between the first feelings
And now, you lay upon a marble floor
Our Melniboné shall not be beautiful
Its anthems will ring hollow and false
It will be less wise, able, without you
No dragons and the masters in the sky
You knew wonder still, as others sneer
Your mind was grace fulfilled, powerful
Yet you know as I, Melnibonéan ways
Your form of flesh was pleasing to view
Broken now in thought of me and no you
We'd be together a day in new horizons
For now lay in death, so cold and alone
I shall hunt the others, all who test you
And then we will sleep anew, together
Eventually enter each others dreams
Together ruling over a new Melniboné 
It will rise, from the depths, renewed
Because our love will become flame
A torch to new generations and proof
Melniboné has always been and will be
The greatest empire, ancient, glorious

(This uses two characters and a setting, Elric the Eternal 
Champion By Michael Moorcock and is not my original 
concept, it is fan written, and asserts no © challenge.)

Art by Harry Clarke, in public domain

Frozen in the moment

The future is uncertain, all our past forgotten
Our decisions ignored and choices laughed at
We have only ghosts, memories and caution
The cemeteries we walk through are trapped
We'll never escape, for we're all ill begotten
Life is the struggle, existence tests the flesh
Held above for public scrutiny and hatred
At the end, terminus is payable on death
We freeze frame, and then face a test
Should one live or die, left aghast 

Before Order Was Lost to Chaos: Zep Tepi

I became aware of the foolish time of the present
The mysteries of antiquity laughed at my question
The world composed of one 20,000 year moment
Or has there been phases of development and loss
As there was now, there was everything before it
Entropy strips away all layers and destroys order
As chaos leads to silence and harmony cast aside
Zep Tepi all before now, existence dwindles time
Without our species memory, it does not matter
Surrounded by an enigma so complex, it is quiet
As we look, but no one perceives the absence

If I matter

If I matter to others, I'd have to doubt it
But I believe as my pain shouts about it
I'm wasting my grace, it'll soon be empty
I've swum in cesspools, one of the many
Existence never relents and so I dream
Let me forever sleep, all my secrets keep
Transcend my temporal cage, in my being
To enter the place I've lived only to find
My body gone, but my soul and mind
Receive reward of these efforts to seek
Remain to perceive and to know belief

Need, Desire, Conflict, Consequences

Despite the confluence of streams, we remain
We might be alive with reason or manic energy
A central hive mind makes decisions, precision
We are alive but subject to the forces and needs
Our passions burn, despite the group's hunger
We'll see one another as stealing their own flow
A world waits but we cannot escape the treason
The flesh submits, the spirit needs are different
The central hive cries out, alone it can't survive
And the end of all being, the spirit alone exists
Even as the flesh demands, our spirit resists

Artist Jean Delville, Symbolist 1894
Parsifal

as the walls encroach

My life was one of some privilege, given hope but with a cost
The standard response might have been success, but I was lost
I'm educated, I was guided to become an artist, but such dross
My work is hated by some, ignored by most, barely exist now
Obeisance due to those needing proper respect and great hope
Life isn't perfect, rarely, my remaining days reveal the cracks
I stand and look off into the distance, while the horizon nears
It will swallow up my being, missing hope, an emptied vessel
These choices all laid before me, and not one means a thing
In emptied hope, dreams never were fulfilled and now bleed
To stare into the burning sun does not blind me, but I bleed
Starved for the things that might sustain me, ink stains still
I've gone so long without normal dreams with no sleep until
It is time for me to leave this place, as the horizons reach
My broken body cannot deliver hope, nor deliver belief
Waiting upon the coroner's team to find my body here
Where they will choose the type of death I received

Running through Barbed Wire

Told I must run after removing my legs, cutting off my feet

I was done and long before the insults to flesh, failed tests

I was overdone, overwhelmed, breathing without a breath

Dreaming without sleep, open eyes and visions of defeat

The dead are the fortunate, as the living face living death

We're called upon to survive as the world around us dies

Crawling towards the escape, but dying before freedom

Focus

Verdant setting, luscious green and the calming waters
A moment of silence, peaceful, time offered on altars
With a purpose to dive deep within, delving lost truth
The focus shattered by thoughts being false, not proof
As thoughts pierce the veil, thoughts cry out for more
The emptiness within, loneliness enters one's core
But here's more than enough to solve the questions
Learn to live determinedly and not just by intention

Getting old and broken

Have you noticed, my flesh is broken and a spirit is missing
My body thrown into the waste bin, can you hear the hissing
The voices of the dead are calling, their bodies lay twitching
I'm not dead, I'm falling, as a book of the dead is printing

A People, Their Flag

Words are ©AlexNess2026 flag is public domain

COST

I haven't the ability to escape, but who wants to leave paradise?
This world offers nothing good, I want only comfort and silence
If I measure the cost of living I know that I cannot pay the price
I know others struggle too, life has a cost but I speak as just one
Living does not guarantee good results, if my pain is relentless
I'll endure, but not as a champion, as a weed that never gives up

To each life a purpose

Every ounce of flesh, desires to be fed
Every lung that lives, desires its breath
Minds call to learn and desire to be more
Every day of life, beckons answers sent
Night to follow, breaking of a bread
Creatures of habit will desire rhythm
No escaping purpose, we must refresh
We are songs but made into anthems
We sing for a new day, never regret
Time given to meaningless things
Rather rise and praise each day
For it is in living we understand
Our world was made for humans
We're all made to serve a calling

Between temporal and permanent dreams

My desires and hungers, they drive me
And I have no mind, to let them decide
Is to live for breath, with nothing more
My only flesh bound existence chosen
As I'm entertained by functions of life
Rather than take my one life and invest
Taking each moment to strive above
My sorrows and my joys are not a test
The bodily existence is bound in love
Until you are founded upon that truth
You'll quest but will run out of time
For it is limited, but love is not

After a change

There is no moisture or frost coming out
My cold breath is a memory, it isn't doubt
I know my way, walking this way often
What is left of me, is memory and dust
My world was shattered without warning
My life was not worth saving, but others
I lost them all, with every unique being
Cast into darkness, no hope to survive
I am lost in sleep, my soul escaped time
Dreaming new worlds to come to be
While I pray and ask God, the maker
What happened to the ones so good
Because without them, I'd have nothing
Without them I have nothing, not even...
                                                           My memories

They Who Remember

The valley contained the bone archives of a past civilization
Eyes widened in horror of how detail oriented archives were
Each life complete in death in a box shaped tumor of shapes
The tombs of their civilization was laid out beginning to end
Perhaps every decision is recorded for history by archivists
Hidden in walls of dwellings, not speaking, just recording
Every people have an ethos, in traits that set them aside 
Perhaps doing everything as a corporal body, remembers
In their memory, a people group lives still, in time's way

False Persistence

I no longer know why I endure, nor why I ever tried. Even when I did. It isn't like there is anything for me here. I might hope for more, but what if there is not a big ol' reward waiting, or something for the lucky guy who waited til the end of the film. It just ends. We all die, it will come. It always does. Death is the end, I don't see it so much as being bad, it happens at the end of everything that came before it.

Maybe I should think about life as less a marathon or a party, see it for what it is, a journey from point a to point b. At least then I can understand why I should bother, if at all. It is a math question. I wish all things could work that I now cannot make work. I wish I could give wonderful acts of kindness to those who need them most. Honestly, living has left me exhausted, and my flesh is weary, my mind is tired.

My life was preordained in the ways that it has gone. It felt like I was playing a role, not finding my story and narrating it. Having little to do and unable, at that, has left me raw. Perhaps it will change.

NO FUTURE HOPES

We never knew how quickly it'd come
Shredded like tissue, flesh never lasted

Ripping of roots, visions once granted

The world mattered less with every age

The degeneration led to need for a cage

Humans were given a destiny, but lost

Unable to perceive, unable to pay cost

Each generation thinks it is the future

We collapsed on ourselves, abusers

Wait for new generations to save us

We've lived, but only in this abyss

Impermanence

The impermanence of existence, bleeds me dry

There is nothing left for living, finding out why

My flesh, each breath, my future life and death

Why worry, it'll be done, sapping all my strength
The end is promised, but beyond is unknown
Yeah I might be broken but I am not alone
Future's are left to the afterlife or nothing
What can I do? What do I know?

Empty Living

Sleeping in all my waking hours, dreamless
Life has drained me of the hope, in duress
I can't bear the weight of my burden or sin
Memories are lost, my heart breaks within
Life given as a gift, but I'm missing living
Every day is not the same, but even worse
My mistakes, my flaws are legion, a curse
I stained my king's banner, hope shattered
 A role I play waiting, existence has purpose
A world alive with danger, our life is blurred

Your sanity has been revoked

There will be those who flee impending destruction
But Damnation is their own cause, lives are fleeting
Survival hasn't been promised, fear is unapologetic
Struggling to take breath, struggling to even scream
The flesh is the soft leather case for the being inside
Minds alive, as a body fails, we become prophetic
It always speak to a mind's archive of existent lies
Displaying life's collection of untruth, denied lives
The life we desire is not the same as what we live
Trails we leave behind us, we aren't able to forgive

“I see paintings or drawings in the poorest
cottages,in the dirtiest corners. And my 
mind is driven towards thesethings with an
irresistible momentum.”   Vincent van Gogh
 

 

Nosferatu

Nosophoros, cruel killer
Known as a Disease Bringer
Mad foreigner, alien, immigrant
Sup upon the blood of children
Steal from the surplus of wealth
Taster of despair, of innocence
Infections devour their core
Wearing the cloak of stealth
Abaddon, son of the dragon
Yes you bring disease, for the poor
But the elite endure only fear
Elites fear as you threaten them
The poor will become victims
As you stalk the black night
For new lives to steal

A moment captured in my eye

This life with you, there's one thing I saw

A world rebels, an empire before the fall

My body, my mind, my flesh unrequited

In my thoughts, I'm in a prison, indicted

Flesh is a cage, my grieving heart taken

All I've desired forbidden, I'm breaking
The past is not the place for healing
It is a wasteland and is hope stealing
Surrender now, refuse to remember
You have no time to reconsider
Time the eternal gravedigger

I OWN A HORROR

These are my visceral horrors of knowing
I shall condemn another being by lies
My flesh corrupt, I will be lost forever
I fain myself the omnipotent, a God 
As I keep secrets that cause others to die
My will was not forged, for others to suffer
No, I forged it myself, for I am weakness
I am a stain, I'm not strength, I am meekness

Sleepwalker Nightmare

Somnambulist stands aware, of dream
Sleepwalker sees within a nightmare
A spiral staircase moving between floors

The world looks no better in waking state

No hope left, but the days of joy are past

Make hay as the sun is high, sure to care

I'm without foundation, crying tears of fate

The golden days of childhood go by fast

The time for freedom and reaping the wind

Goes far away soon, swift beyond compare

All we must hold upon flees our grasp

There is nothing left within

The substance inside us tears

Reality revealed in a slap

Saying it is now done

The Path of Brokenness

By now in every throat, feelings choke

Turning ignorance into the endgame

What if by trying we might choose now

Find a way through fog and indecision

I'm permanently broken on this path
In a road of destruction and wrath
The days are shattered in memory

Taken As Far As the Wind and Currents Take Us

We spent our life rowing our dragon ship, fighting an enemy
The world was bigger than our imagination, and time together
We didn't have a plan, or map, or guideline, an empty destiny
But the world was far older than we knew, perhaps forever old
As stars above the ocean shine, the moon gives light upon a way
Rowers count and rhyme in sequence, know that good is waiting
Whatever shores we aspire to reach, whatever hoard we'll take
Every day offers more than toil, as long as the pilot navigates
Our mother is the earth, our father is our guide, together
Face what we must, fighting back to back, hand to hand
This world is our home, wherever we will land

Dedicated BWN1961-12312022

An old scribe shared truths with the young kindred

The elder scribe gathered around him
Began to tell the listeners how to live
We know goodness as we know evil
A thought primitive and eternal calls
Inside we make sacrifices and hold
The selfish never met a time to share
As those who have abundance inside
What is too much to the mind of one
Is far too little and without substance
Another who has learned to survive
Find reason to endure, others do not
Some never need to find the reasons
Some never live without challenges
Making the best of lives is enough
Helping others survive is truly love
Find your end goals, gather your kin

Dreams End

The day death comes, I hope to know better

At the moment, the future is cold and empty

I'll die before the day I finish my endeavors

I'm fool, a sinner, a heart dying in my winter

Yes I'm hopeful, it might be this world is hell
Death's day may be end to pain, as it lingers 

In the end, choirs sing anthems, ring the bell
The loss of material existence will seem pale
Compared to a possible loss of eternal being
Eventually we will truly know our eternal fate
The after life offers greater life than dreams
Beauty, glory, golden streets and anthems
Eternity has no tears, for it only has peace

“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not
the same river and he's not the same man.” Heraclitus

A mind etched in pain

The night cannot hide my fear, found in a sleeping heart
Found inside my mind, the tears there are bound in scars
Bleeding while I know the voice of pain, inside I'm dark
Betrayed by a mind, I was stabbed by an anger and pain
Flesh cannot continue to be healthy, rotting, I'm insane
An outer visage equals my inner rot, I scream in pain
My life reached an end, I wait now to die, for release
I have nothing inside me, I will never have peace