Another church mouse.

Another church mouse.

I am no more out there

Than I am in here

Silence is a strange accompaniment

To the passage from one state

To another.

A church is a quiet place.

So much for grandeur

When the weight of it cows the spirit.

Some say that is the way

It is meant to be

Heads bowed

In supplication.

Know your place

And it is on your knees

‘Bow before your betters

Dear boy.’

Some of the nicest people I have met

Were flogged by them.

The playing fields of Eton

Might look green

But deeply runs

The stain of blood,

The price we pay for deference

Is unending.

Shout if you want to

It will echo like a canyon

The sound of an alpine horn

Would have been as godly

To the ancients.

Ever do we roam

From one dream to the next

Plotting our escape

Never leaving the safety

Of our own thoughts

Even as they plague us.

I am a bright spark

In the darkness

And evermore will be so

Until the light dwindles

Down to its final guttering.

Am I aware of its waning

Will there be a core of me

A hard drive

Burned to a crisp

Too damaged to access

Without an administrator?

Is that all we are

At the end

A corrupted memory card

In need of reading?

As the silence grows

The pain of its passing

Grows louder

Even as the mourners wail

The noise is lost

In the vacuum.

Kings and Queens are crowned

In silence.

The sound of a chair

As blasphemous as a curse

Nothing is worse

Than the sound of ‘goodbye’

As it rattles around your head

Trying to make a connection

When the power is down

And there is no reserve.