All Marvels Cease

Everything the world makes to impress
ceases
In the quiet

When the curtain’s torn down
clever words cease, broad dreams cease
Nothing’s amazing, nothing’s exceptional,
nothing’s bright or beautiful.

Once you place them in the hand and peer at them,
They’re all just noise.

The placid audience waits for its encore
but gets none
The curtain ripped from its rusty moorings
There’s only music to walk out the doors to

I wrestle with this noise in the absence of light,
where all marvels cease to impress the world.

You who can
carry me through the darkness,
leave me
soundless on the doorstep.

(Orignally published in Outsider Writers, 2007)