He tried to recall the shape of the hall
All about him cacophonic sound
Bodies crashed into him constantly
His limbs ached from colliding with things
He felt his way forward
Recalling the shape of the hospital wings
At last he found the stairs
After crawling through what seemed like blood
Squashed with a hundred screaming others
Pouring down the stairs in flood
This was a nightmare beyond any other
As for five hours he made his way
Negotiating heaving, squeezing bodies
Toward the light of day
When he finally got there,
it was not by light he knew
But by the feel upon his cheek
of the fresh cool breeze that blew
And by the feel of cold concrete
of the sidewalk where he lay
Panting, exhausted, bloody and sore
in complete dismay
How could he get home from here?
He had to bring himself to think
At least the screaming was less out here
But even greater was the stink
So many more had passed this way
Even than inside
At the moment of blindness bowels were loosed
And many had since died
The stench hit his nostrils time and again
And woke him from his sleep
There was nothing else that he could do
But only onward creep
His knees were bloody and wreathed in pain
So he rose onto his feet
Grasping a lamppost near him
He began slowly to repeat
The mantra that would drive him on
And kill his lethargy and pain
He kept repeating: “I MUST them”
But first he knew he needed food
And rest before the long journey ahead
His ears had become more sensitized
As he listened with growing dread
The screaming was being replaced
By a sobbing which wrenched his heart
He instinctively headed toward silence
And the place his search would start.
Simulcra 11751A
The theory was that they once had sense
These ugly simulacra of the past tense
Sliding along down there on the ground
Even under a rock one had been found
Pale pink in color they had a slimy hue
Grunting dimly when poked, right on cue
Evidence there was here of cataclysmic force
Perhaps enough to annihilate in due course
All around was concrete and tarmac pieces
Tiny slivers of metal and toxin releases
Water was the main feature of this place
But their cities had been lost without trace
We said “their” but then we wondered “who?”
Surely not this beast with its pinkish hue!
We looked in vain for an alternate source
But returned to the pink one in due course
As unlikely as it seemed this travesty of form
Was the sole candidate to fit the norm
Which a spectrum of planets had shown to be
The aggressives that rises in history
No other candidate here could be found
Though we searched the sky and on the ground
Only this poor specimen that foraged here
Grunting melancholic in its petulant fear
Finally we found a scrap of spoken word
With an image of a beast truly quite absurd
It walked on two legs and had ridiculous hair
Unlike any form that may be said to be fair
The likeness to the ground-crawler could not be denied
It was pink and hairy and constantly cried
We saw this from its open jaws clearly crowing
These beasts of hell were called ‘Elvis’ we saw
Distasteful of visage, so brutish and raw
Only this tiny scrap of their “culture” we found
Before we leapt from that garbage in one single bound.
A Final Wave Goodbye
She was perfectly, perfectly blue
Here, deeply azure, there, of royal hue
The only sound the gentle lapping
and the clean, fresh air soughing
Ever rising with the moon and gently falling
This was ‘Wave’ as they had found her
and as they had begun to call her
Through the visor all was water gleaming
Ship hovered, within, her crew, each one intently gazing
Where were the continents?
Each soul aboard was filled with dread
There was no sign of any land at all . . .
Nor of life. Was all now dead?!
But, below the waves life existed still,
the species which had survived
in perfect and sustainable form,
while others had slowly died
The probe sped through the deep
and soon the signs appeared
Within the weed and barnacle growth
the traces they had feared.
An outline too square and regular
to be nature’s organic form
A girder suspended in a crevice wide
within a sea-kelp storm
Lines of green along regular paths
and lumps of malformed cliff
then spires of towering darkness
emerged bleak and still and stiff
The only movement the slow heaving wave
in a silence total here
Hearts weighed heavy in their breasts,
reflecting nameless fear
Back on Ship they were gathered morose
in the great meeting room
the progress of their doom
For them it had taken 9 brief months
for their trip to Alpha C5
But here a century had now passed,
leaving their kind no longer alive
Time was now of the essence
and the crew ordered to their stations
The choice was reduced to only one,
to leave on ‘Roulette Rations’
Each day of transit one would be taken
for food to feed the others
And so sustain humanity’s hope
for future sisters and brothers
There had been a cataclysmic ending here,
a reckoning for the Eden of Man
The fate of their kind now rested with them
and in a desperate plan
Looking back at this tiny ball of blue
as their ship took to the skies,
all felt a breaking wave in their hearts
as salt tears fell from their eyes.
Dear Reader,
May your Dreamworld dawn each day of your lives . . .
If you have enjoyed reading my book I would humbly ask you to take the time to write a brief review of it at whatever e-publishing site you downloaded my book from.
For me the greatest joy is in creation and I wish this to be true for you also. All too often our m
odern world teaches us to receive rather than to create and give. With myriads of input sources out there seeking our attention we can easily become overwhelmed and come to believe that only in our dreams can we generate fantasies of our own. I would encourage you to engage with your creative spirit, no matter how dormant it may seem to be within you. Open your heart. Release the dream.
In that way you may experience your daytime dreams connecting seamlessly with those of the night in a beautiful, creative new dawn. I wish that for you with all my heart.
Farewell my friend . . . until a New Dawn rises!
Allan Edward Tierney
Please click on the links below for access to my website, blog and forum.
My website is here: http://allanedwardtierney.com/
Here you can find out some of the things that make me tick.
The page includes an email comment box. I would love to hear from you, I promise to write back to you as soon as possible after receiving your email. Also included are in-page displays of my Twitter account, Facebook page and my current blog.
My full blog is here: http://allanedwardtierney.blogspot.sk/
I would be honoured indeed if you came to read awhile.
My poetry forum is here: http://allanspalace.com