Second Sight (2025)

It's been a time

This life of mine,

It's been a time.

There have been

Dead zones,

Dread zones,

Black as pitch.

Harrowing,

Scouring,

Drowned in a ditch.

There's been fire times,

Pyre times,

Combustion of the mind!

Dire times,

Gyre times,

Cruelly unkind.

So what?

I do what I can

When I can,

No-one knows it keener.

No mere fledgling now -

My bite is all the keener.

My talons long,

My grip is strong,

I've angels left and right -

White fire,

Dread cold,

They've given second sight.

I've lit on the shoulders of giants;

The gifted and divine,

Those close grasped by the hand of God -

The prophets most sublime.

I've cleaved to the ones who loved me,

I thrust them far and wide,

Pressed up against the boundaries edge

And still I have not died.

I've been struck dumb by crippling torment,

I've pranced in the fires of the noon;

The behests of the winds that draw me

To Sun

and Earth

and Moon.

I've put myself in danger,

I've fostered dreadful strife -

Black pit and

Lidless fire eyes

Will never take my life.

It's been a time,

This life of mine,

I'm like a falcon resting;

I've soared sublime,

Been drowned in rime,

My stoop's now for the testing.

God grant me strength,

And fire and heart,

Not manic fabrication.

God grant me peace,

A steady wind -

A heartfelt supplication.

Providence has brought me here,

And grace pervades my life;

Until I'm called to Heaven's Vault

I'll never cease to strive.