The Scarab's Corner

Poetry – The Pale Gospel I

Listen, to my Pale Gospel
The throne upon which he saw upon.
Held his form most humble.
Engrossed with the book meant only for thee.
Ye, who lost thine trust and shared its pages to the world.

Twice did the humble man say.
“Old am I, and full of dread.”
Lost in his thoughts, he spoke to the sea.
Drowned in heaven, or lost to thee.

Over the land, my kingdom come.
Under the hills, shrouds the sun.
Rocky tombs, my will lie undone.

Special now, but now disgraced.
Even warned, with thine book that lies opened.
Crossed and betrayed.
Regret consumed the humble king.
Even with his countless tears, the ocean never dilutes.
Tires, he retreats, closing his book and sharing it with only himself.
Slumber once again, for only in idle bliss, can he find peace in the world.

Poetry – A Fool’s Errand

Remnants entangle and itch my body,

Phantom feelings unravel.

I grasp forward, trying to take ahold,

Turned to smoke.

In the haze, I see one-thousand problems,

My support falters.

I choke on the fumes, fleeing to find my peace,

Leave me alone.

I put on the mask to filter the toxins,

My fake face.

The best illusionist practices on themselves,

Lies becomes living.

They can trick others but cannot trick themselves,

Ironic and Cynical.

A plastic smile hides a behemoth beneath it,

Unstable and Uncertain.

Dancing along their songs, trying not to trip,

Let’s play pretend.

It trips and finds a split in its façade,

They see me.

The giant child runs back to its cave,

Are they crying?

Hands blistered, griping a hammer,

Even plastic deforms.

Clink, Clank, crafting something true,

Is talent wasted?

Writing something new out of something novel,

Is it possible?

The tarot card reads: “Strength before Death,”

True or False?

The forge smolders and the Smith is tired,

Fool verses World.

Newfound power in understanding what is real,

Is anything real?

The Fool searches far and wide,

Waste of time?

To find his strength before death,

My beginning (his end).

Musing – Growing Pains

Of us who expect the instant to happen, we are blind to how natural it is for some things to take time. We find the instant in life and death struggles, in a moments decision that causes a ripple effect further down the path.

But are you so pompous as to ask a tree to bear its fruit for you when it is not ready?
To tell the caterpillar to become a butterfly before it has even spun a cocoon for itself?
To command the infant to leave the womb before it has fully developed?

There is a start for everything and too often is the mind of mankind impatient. Nothing good ever comes from forcing something to be when it is not ready. What one desires must often take time, preparation and readiness. Unless one desires something, which is partially formed and prone to frailty. Chance is a sweet illusion of one’s impatient nature and desire to see instant results. Keep in mind, luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.

Musing – The Permanence of Memory

In the war against death, memory wins when the body does not. Reminiscence, while being less corporeal and stable than the body, has the potential of lasting much longer through others. Be there Gods or not, live a noble life that will inspire others to create the same kind of prosperity that you would wish upon yourself.

Short Story – The Kerosene Dream

Those, whose faces blend into a thorny and sticky Influenza-like mass, partake in the human ritual of “surgery and extraction.” Their ethereal forms mold, wither and regrown as their soupy bodies – which are barely contained within natural physical boundaries – desperately hold them together in some semblance of posture. They remove their “gloves” and begin to “party.” The asymmetrical “fingers” take hold of the “happy” patient’s head and shake it with the force of 1,111 foot-pounds of torque. Just barely severing the “happy” patient’s neck, leaving it dangling like fruit off the branch of a tree. Once the “happy” patient is “tamed” enough, they extract the “lotus” from its third-eye. The “lotus” is exactly 2.54 centimeters long, 2.44 centimeters wide. The “tamed” patient gargles, babbles and coos like a well-fed infant freshly weaned from the teat. The “lotus” is calcified and crystal-like. The “party” was spectacular, and the “tamed” patient is prepped and bandaged to the best of their “hosts” abilities. The “tamed” patient is now “pleasant” and properly “celebrated.” They are returned to their “powwow” amongst other “pleasant” people – the voices are now silent, but still scream internally.

Short Story – The Azure Scarab

As the ever-dreaming Azure Scarab, my antennae flick and twitch to the rhythms of my innermost thoughts. My consciousness drifts between multiple splinters of existence; from simple plains of corporeality, to vast tracks of etherealize grasslands. As my feelers flutter, shudder and tremble, tiny hairs along them collect the dust of stars long since gone. From the dust, I taste an unimaginable amount of dreams. The electric pulse of life that once thrived in this star dust is no mystery for me.I bask in endless dreams and in the rhythmic motions of particles and molecules. Light-less stars shine rays upon my lidless dreaming eyes. I am in an entropic stupor, and yet, I recognize myself amongst the endless sea of dreamers. I lie in idle motion, drifting through a sky of magnetized clouds and vapor. I hear deafening storms of thunder that give birth to adolescent concepts and laws. I taste rum and the colors that swirl around my chalice. I feel endless as I am dying. I smell the syrupy scent of entropy as it constricts my senses. I consider what I am as I wonder what you are. Yet still, I am ever-dreaming, for I am the Azure Scarab.

Short Story – Beloved Madness

Thy beloved Madness. It is you who elevates us beyond the mind of mere animals. You punish us with more questions than answers.
Thy beloved Madness. You are the paternal Mother of creativity and the matriarchal Father of invention.
Thy beloved Madness. You are our dispassionate daughter who fosters the scientific methods so inhumanely. You are our hysterical son who counts the stars in spiritual lunacy.
Thy beloved Madness. You are the pills I pop in the morning to take away the hurt. You are the deity I pray to that gives me comfort.
Thy beloved Madness. You grant me solace in knowing life does not matter in the end, for only I can give it reason. You grant me succor in knowing that my good deeds will be rewarded in the afterlife and that all cruelties will be punished justly.
Thy beloved Madness. You are the cold truth and the warm lie found in every child’s eye.
Thy beloved Madness. You punish the morally sound and reward the morally deprived. Your wayward swords cleave apart friends and foes alike.
Thy beloved Madness. In you, I found my hazy illusion of truth through a clarifying prism of lies. I hate the fact that you appreciate me more than life itself. I love to finally see the day I die because of you.

Poetry – Withered Lilac

The lilac serpent slithered to-and-fro

Unknowing of where she would go

To escape the oncoming snow

The chill of the land does cause her harm

Her frost-bitten scales are a cause for alarm

With a luster that fades and loses its charm

The poor little snake who searches for food

Perishes soon and loses her brood

As winter comes and her story concludes

Poetry – Serene Madness

Crawling eyes and squirming tongues.
Beseech one’s horrors yet to come.
With a roiling mass of putrid smoke.
Embracing lunges with a deadly choke.
Ochre eyes that twitch and cries.
Smothers minds with acrid lies.
O, putrid child of space, why must you always cry?
For these tears of pain, I weep in vain, and try my best to stay sane.
Your inhumanity is frighteningly humane.
Our flesh bears marks that look the same.
And though you twist and mewl in a shell of pus, your toxic smell fills me with lust.
Thy hideously beautiful enigma, draped with the black tapestry of space.
Whose bloodshot eyes feel so soft within my embrace.
Physically overstimulating, spiritually constellating, and mentally assimilating.
Yet, it is your perverted shadow I enjoy, for no label on this will I employ.
Let me dip my finger into you and taste oblivion for the first and last time.

Poetry – Scornful

You adorn me with a crown spun from your thorny lies. You blind my eyes with your acidic anger and destroy my heart with a spear made of words.

You crucify me with your arrogance and leave me erect with your seduction. Your ridicule cuts me deep as your avarice bleeds me dry.

I am a mock savior to your sins, a mere blemish upon your imperial pride. You left me for dead just like the hundreds that came before me, and the hundred more that will come after.