Five Poems by Silvatiicus Riddle

 

The Heart of War 

 

The raised blade covers half my face,

and reflects for you, half your own.

 

I glimpse myself, half-victim.

You glimpse yourself, half-villain.

 

From the eye of the rolling sun, 

to the misty ear of the mountain,

whom might wager a bet from afar,

calling wicked truths from noble deeds, telling

any face for another?

 

You cannot force the flower of verity

to unbloom; to fold up 

around the jewel of knowing,

the seeds that germinate

in the heart of broken men.

 

Cleaving the air, 

the blade's flash falls swift.

And, quietly, we both turn,

walk each other

home. 

 

“I once had an ocean.”

            For Tex 

 

I had a therapist once, and I told her that I revel in my sadness, that I don’t try to climb out so quickly, that I like to rest there, and let it hurt for a while. She acted as though I had just admitted to the cardinal sin of wellness. But, I knew she was wrong. Sadness isn’t the enemy. It never was. Apathy is the true enemy. Sadness is the price you pay for loving deeply, and loving well. Love is capturing sea water in the palm of your hand, knowing, carelessly, that it will soon go away, but still trying to care for it anyway. Sadness is the empty palm, the dregs of salt left behind.

It is saying, “I once had an ocean”.

 

I once had an ocean. And it was glorious.

It was wild. It was cooling. It was kind.

It showed me violence.

It showed me magic.

It showed me meekness.

It showed me loss. It gave to me my reflection.

It gave to me my heart—a moss-covered, jagged thing,

smoothed and carved by the tumble, the rolling depths of time.

 

I once had an ocean. I captured it myself.

And still, it went away.

I don’t think it was ever mine, actually.

But, I could pretend for a time that it was.

And some days I can still feel it in my hands—the coolness of it there,

the arch and curve of its back, how it lapped at my fingers now and then,

the storied salt beneath my nails,

the soft and fearsome waves come and gone,

the dreams it left behind. 

 

 

The Pulse of Stars 

 

Life, death,

life, death,

sunrise, moonrise,

life, death,

sunrise, life,

moonrise, death,

inhale, life,

exhale, death,

ebb and flow–

the waves

of the ocean,

it is all

the same,

and so

the pulse

of the stars

continue. 

 

The Soul is a Walled Garden

An Ode To Little Edie

 

Is a garden still a garden 

when the flowers, taken by weeds,

wither black and shrink from the sun,

when my summer dance has just begun,

and mother’s song swims 

beneath the sweeping eaves?

 

And what makes a weed ‘not a flower’?

Is it that they do not weaken, they endure—

and mark not the hours that shine, petal by petal,

but flourish like ivy with the sweet sting of nettle,

wild poets of bitter medicine; an ounce of gold

traded for a pound of cure?

 

So the garden blooms fed the earth;

in Winter’s cold they fell, resigned—

and the ghosts of friends like phantoms swept

from stair to room, in hallways crept—

was it real, or eras past;

the crumbling mansions of the mind?

 

Although the golden hour has come to pass,

the stars still flicker like city lights,

I lay beneath them, number my dreams,

for there was never a line, but certainly seams

between the past and present, where I can go

behind closed eyes, and slip from sight.

 

Daydreams of a time when the world comes looking

for me down the lanes, over the drives;

will they see the weeds or the roses that grow?

Will they see me as I surely know?

A weed–no, a flower! spurned by the world,

in defiance, still thrives.

 

The soul is a walled garden

that cannot be breached by death;

wherein my heart, unassuming,

planted flowers, ever-blooming

in brilliance, undisturbed;

see how they dance with every breath.

 

The Little Astronomer 

 

“Your days of mischief are done!”

said Mother, to the dreamer, her son.

He still slipped away, though,

with the eyes of Galileo,

when he swore he'd captured the sun!

Silvatiicus Riddle (He/They) is a 7x Rhysling Award-nominated Dark Fantasy/Speculative Fiction Writer & Poet haunting the bones of an old amusement park on the edge of New York City. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in: Strange Horizons, Apex Magazine, Enchanted Living, Eternal Haunted Summer, Spectral Realms, and Creepy Podcast, among others. He combats despair and entropy with his newsletter, The Goblin's Reliquary. For all available works, please visit: http://linktr.ee/silvatiicusriddle