The echoes of the silence
that riddle the cosmic space
enclosing man
in a harmonious
and claustrophobic eternity,
like a marriage band
worn with the gold and silver
years of living

submerge the finite consciousness
of my mind
and I cannot breathe
as the memories bind
and wash all over me,
cleansing the moment
with the scent
and phantom figure
of the past parading
with a tragic-comic face
into the fugitive present

as the hourglass of Time,
thrown by an unseen hand
against the naked blue wall
of the universe,
breaks the spell when
it shatters into a million shards,
splashing infinitely-numbered
grains of
canary-yellow sand
in a cascade across the floor
of a sorely needed reality check
to the chaos within that sets
the temple of my flesh
on fire, purging
the spirit that so often
lifts me up
of the revenant
of temptation and inconstant,
fleeting desire.