The Reclamation of Atlantis

Emblems  of value -
The quiet hands fashion them
In word, in stone -
The pillars of our past
Bear but slowly up the
Weight  of endless centuries
As  understanding crumbles
With our  pages and
Ink fades.

Our parchment  thins and
Withers in these
Neon  times that rush garish and
Oblivious through the
Wastes  of cyberspace - the
Children of tomorrow will not
Thank  us for our unwise ways -

But there is no going back.

Life is a hoarding of grains:
The store added
Year on year, each
Grain of husk and
Kernel represents its own
Demise  - the precious
Seconds that we pour -
The containers that we are -
Vast, singular, each
Passing act captured and
Sustained.

In the silence of October's
Grey  and dimming  days when
The sun is gone and
Cloud-pall covers the
City like a shroud -

My  lights are bright
In gathering; the reclamation
Of  a past when
Days  were young  and clear,
Unambiguous.

Our  fear is that our
Pillars will not last - their
Composite  strength worn-
Down   by time, abraded
By  a wind that scours
Relentlessly their tender

Curves and  grooves bearing
Shape with
Pride in the tapping hands that
Fashioned them  -
Are fading to thin lines, -
Mere  erosions, where

Ill-defined and
Careless eyes refuse to see
The intricacies of beauty. This is
The rush-hour  of our kind,
The blind leading
The blind, where all our

Fineness is abased and
Stone turns into listlessness;
All our ink
Hardens into hieroglyph.

The crowds  tear by so fast they
Blur into one vast colour and
Cacophany  that drowns  the gentle
Calligraphic act of
Script and margin  - our common  blandness is

Grief to those who  feel it -
Unaligned  and sentient they
Mourn  the  scripted stone,
Touch  the wood  that is undone,
Refuse to condone  the fever-
Pitch of all our days: nations
Lost  in the glitter of
False promises  - they             • -
Trust in the chiseller to hold firm,
Keep  his hand in
For  the right time of
His calling

When   we have  lost the race
And  the speaking stones are our own  face -
Emblems   of our pain - then
The  quiet hands, will be valuing
And  sculpting to reclaim
Our  lost civilization.

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