A Tour of Great Passing

Red glares of flare enclose the browning sands,
To sketch evenings with shades of swarthy light.
Shadowless smoke clears blood from tainted lands,
Where letterless doves attempt their wingless flight.
Short wheeze of pant and puff follows the breeze of fall,
Though views atop towers are now of greenest hills.
The death of breath escorts a long life’s call,
As dreary dust destroys the wailing wills.
My fingers run rough, through armed and jagg’d balustrade,
Unlike oozing hands which once had gripped in vain.
My ears still can perceive silence of fragments made,
Of flourish of horses, of trumpets, of alive and slain.
Countless remain, in graves from trench and moat,
A shepherd stays, to graze the sheep on nature’s coat.
Then why the mark, if it doth burn? Yet whence can we recover the cinder?

Silent Smoke’s Elegy

The candles ignite the sparks of day,
Though west-blowing winds doth break its flame.
Slivers of silver formed in its name,
Are the remnants of ash and hay.
While wingless wyverns streak into the sky,
Draped with petals of blossomed peach,
Under fallen flowers, each atop each,
Envious snakes seek to peek and fly.
A strand of smoke still shows its life,
Yet hides its form beneath clouds’ clouts.
Never should it hear human shouts,
Nor shower down all nature’s strife.
It collects its power until evening hours,
Where acquainted with death the Garden is.
As drizzles hear silent hisses of darkness,
Lighthouses’ beacon shimmers and flounders.
But it falls not, as anger knows not condensation,
As the rest humours the honours of heaven.

Written by Oliver Dai and published on 12/12/2020. Header image by Byron Johnson via Unsplash.