City Of Souls

Collaboration with the very talented "The Viking", it has been an honour working with a man with a brilliant mind, and great ideas. Any errors are down to me!

A truck stop on the Souls Highway

My foot and tires find rest on the gravel

Beneath a moon I faintly recognize.

Down this midnight interstate I’ve travelled,

Far away from the City of Souls.

My feet itch, My palms sweat

Faint whisper of beckoning opportunity

Passage of time offering sweet immunity

Where all my ghosts can be laid to rest.

Sit with me, honey, in this dusty light.

Your eyes look heavy in that pretty face.

A sorrow weighs upon your heart tonight;

Let’s have a drink before the highway calls.

Tell this stranger a secret,

And maybe I'll tell you some of mine.

City of old seeped in dust and mayhem

Hungry pavements swallow every love song

Lyrics twisted into the raw bitter end

Sung shallow with empty emotion

Love trapped in colours of rainbows

Bowing in solitude, weeping with loneliness.

I could tell you a similar story,

Of streets that reek of gasoline and rage.

A sodium beacon between Los Angeles and Hell.

Jutting from the desert like a steel Jericho

In this city, gunslingers fell,

In this city, mad ghosts do tell.

I have seen the rivers of freedom

Visionary grasps in beckoning dreams

Gulping sweetness of pure oxygen

I swear, likened to town of Bethany

Where no twisted bitterness exists

No land of heartbroken casualties

They told me all this, of Paradise bliss

Suitcase packed, ghosts I escape

So take me, take me to this place.

I knew an earthbound Heaven like you speak

A port anointed in crystal moonlight.

The energy of the night could strike you blind,

Igniting the purest fires between hearts.

This desert, though, holds no place like that.

No Mount of Olives or waking Lazarus.

I ask, from your ghosts do you truly escape

Or into the arms of demons do you run?

My ghosts track beating of my heart

My demons restless each day after dark

I see you, we share the same cup

And yet,hollow are your bones, eyes of sorrow

Cold is the air, your skin paper thin

What is it my travelling friend that haunts you?

Where do I end and you begin?

Are your memories telling of my extinction?

Extinction would be a blessing

Once locked in that concrete labyrinth.

It is a hub of divinites and ghosts,

Where none are meant to linger.

It is Sheol and Abaddon.

I happened by it in ages past,

Only to fulfill a judgment upon my soul.

I burned to the ground the place I called Heaven

And for this I wander between worlds,

Hovering through the ages.

As for your end, the choice be yours.

For you will pass through this City regardless.

You could live out your illusion and stay,

Forever a spirit when dust claims your bones

Or keep driving through without looking back

To an unwritten future ahead.

I abandon into your words

my nervous hands flutter

beating like wings of a bird snared

slapping sullen bitter air

lights flash behind my eyes

squeezing back the tired years,

I am breathless, I am home

Salty rivers, hopelessly alone

Have I sung my last song

Entering your dying paradise?

Shame burns my pale skin

Your angel feathers dying

land softly at my feet

Don't fear destiny, love.

This chance meeting in this dingy bar

Appeared in the stars ages before,

And unstitched events that chaotically swarm

Close together ultimately in the eye of God.

I'd best hit the road and so should you,

Before the morning gets too old.

Had I met you in another lifetime,

I'm sure my story would've been ours.

But my love waits in another world

Patiently waiting in the ocean moon.

I must escape the first rays of Dawn

Yet toward Dawn's light you must drive.

Two pairs of headlights travel down the Soul's Highway.

Reviews

[EMP]

this was so good. you use all the right techniques to make a good poem: strong vivid imagery, enjambements, even though there's no particular rhyme scheme i love the subtle rhyme you have put in there 'gravel, travelled' 'home, alone' etc etc. and more! well done, a really good write. :)

[Pokie]

To put it in simple words, I really, really enjoyed reading this. I love poetry in general, and I really like longer poems, yet my mind has a tendency to drift if I don't feel...engaged in the work. When I read this, I wa soaking up every word, sqeuuzing every emotion and color out of it as I could, and I find that very impressive. This is a very beautiful piece of writing, and I thank you for sharing it with us.
Masterful.

-Pokie

[Tina Kline]

Yes, we almost seem never to be happy or content with what we have but always wanting more, probably why new lands were discovered, why humans may someday travel space and will probably travel far out in space someday, why people go deep into oceans or to the tops of high mountains or create new things, new discovers, because so many humans are not content, sometimes it ends in a positive way, sometimes not. Anyway, this is a brilliant collaboration, very grand and sweeping all all ways possible. Very impressive, I think.

[Brett Campaigne]

It comes together quite cohesively, like you two are certainly living the perspectives in which you are writing. A beautiful coalesce.

[Coyote Poetry]

A amazing poem. Kind of poem needed to be read a few times. I like the language and the conversation of the poem. Life is a highway of good and bad decisions. I like the complete poem. Ending was outstanding.
Coyote

[StacyPerry]

Very descriptive and well done.

[Geralyn Miller]

As one who once sought solace in a multitude of lands, traveling the Earth , meeting the people, embracing the cultures and absorbing as much as is possible; I finally found the peace I sought in the very place I began my journey. I discovered that it isn't where we are, but how we feel about those places, and the people in them. Home is where we make it, family is the people who love us, related or not.

[The Warrior Poet]

This is very well executed.

[TAO]

It is true that there are very undesireable places to live, though. I'm more comfortable, if not happy, amongst places that have lots of trees (something I was reminded of when I re-entered the place where my family lives). Of course, your dwelling place does not ultimately determine your future happiness. So, while I might think you're wrong, I also think you're right. I know, contradiction, but it is what it is.

So...now that I've wasted your time not reviewing the work, I'll get to it. I have to agree that this is a masterful piece of work you and Viking have done here. It's nothing short of inspiring. It has a strong message delivered with the skill I've come to expect from you (and forgive my expectation, but you really are extremely skilled at what you do; I'd be surprised to see something you've written that wasn't awesome...of course, then we could say 'there's a first time for everything' and leave it at that). Bubo (and Viking), remarkable piece of work, and that's definitely not saying enough.