As golden as our gait might seem,
We cannot run much faster,
The more we pace at rates extreme,
The closer steps disaster.
As brightly as our stars might shine,
Be they cast upon a silver screen,
Or raised as part of night’s design,
Both in time become routine.
As noble as we paint our cause,
With posture and good poise,
If the canvas is but full of flaws,
Then thus itself destroys.
. As often as not, our pledged convictions,
. Meet the knot of contradictions.

© Tim Grace, 19 April 2011

To the reader: The source of a disaster becomes more obvious at the point of no return; at the precipice!. That inevitable conclusion, that certainty, delivers that unavoidable consequence; that calamity. That ‘that’ was always going to have that ending. For that ending was designed into that beginning. That be so. That be that.

To the poet: When is a poem not a riddle? I often write surrounded by people doing crosswords; riddling out a cryptic solution. The obtuse poem and the cryptic riddle have much in common… word play. Together in time, apart in place, we silently sip our coffee untangling semantic clues. For the poet, unlike his company, he poses and answers his own riddles.

closer steps disaster