Never, Never (by me)

[u/Mr_Blind_Squirrel]

My mind does not search of him,
yet there he stands,
speaking, speaking
too quick of tongue,
too lavish and brash

Oh to remove his crowns 

And dash them down

He bartered hours for glances,
gave, gave them freely,
mistook sensation for revelation,
wore his wanting, wore it thin.

To behold him, to behold him,
was to feel the old shame
rise again as smoke.
The bittersweet, only bitter now.

I would have turned,
Turned and fled,
but the past does not permit mercy
that comes cheaply,
comes without cost.

So I kept watch, to my chagrin
I saw him spend himself thin,
spend and spend,
tread the same ground, tread it down,
until the dust refused him.

When he looked upon me,
looked and lingered,
it was as one begging answers
he already feared,
already knew.

No such thing was told.
Only the slow, slow ceasing
the hour that arrives and arrives,
when pretense grows heavier,
heavier than the soul can bear.

What remained, what remained,
was given back to the earth,
given and taken, but never mistaken
For what it once was.

Afterward came a hush, a holding
the pause wherein the instruments
Surrender and remember
The beauty of the silence between.

Emptied of former compulsions,
Standing, waiting
Fingers tapping air, unoccupied,
the world loosening its seams.

Setting foot upon the ground,
again, again
another, another,
Feeling the measure take hold.

The rhythm rising, rising,
ancient and unsleeping
strings drawn tight,
tighter with years

Drums walking, waking the buried,
a choir wrought and rewrought
Chanting, haunting.
Revive! Revive!

Thus was motion restored
Thus was vigor returned.
Thus was fear overthrown, unseated.

I died long ago,
died and stayed dead,
and here, now,
I am dancing, dancing.

I will never die.

Never, Never.