No More Desire for Light

By Bud Koenemund

I know one way to express devotion:
Offering my entire heart and soul –
Withholding nothing; risking emotion
Perilous; braving passion uncontrolled
By intellect. And, the cost has become
Too dear as torment strips vitality,
Inducing me to wish all feeling numbed –
Surrender slouching toward finality.
In truth, love has caused me nothing but pain.
Though, I doubt any revelation
Of zeal could bring joy when such unrestrained
Affection only invited destruction.
   I will feign no more desire for light;
   Leaving my soul abandoned and blighted.

We Said Our Goodbyes

By Bud Koenemund

Of course, I had to see you walk away –
My eye drawn to you like a firefly’s
Light in darkness – while memory replayed
The moment when passion withered and died.
Of course, I had to see you walk away;
Enduring one more stab in the heart.
Unable to simply go about my day:
You’d just be gone; leaving me torn apart.
Of course, I had to see you walk away.
We’d said our goodbyes already. But fate
Wouldn’t allow peace, and time won’t belay
Pain. Still, I’ll not let my love become hate.
   Each day, I seek to put sadness behind;
   E’en as your absence constantly reminds.

Fire Cannot Feed Upon Itself

By Bud Koenemund

With apologies to Galway Kinnell

Fire cannot feed upon itself. Lacking
Fuel to sustain, it will suffocate;
Dying away – light dwindling toward black –
As flames, once furious, quickly abate.
To make it burn, I threw my whole self in;
Sacrificing pride; nourishing our spark;
Then realized I could never kindle
Passion matching mine; that knowledge a stark
Reminder of the wasteland devotion
Leaves behind – solitude seared in my soul;
Scorched by incendiary emotion,
While embers, neglected too oft’, grow cold.
   The love extinguished cannot be renewed;
   Yet, memory smolders with thoughts of you.

Affection's Embers

By Bud Koenemund

(Written: November 2020)

It may sound hyperbolic; cliché;
Or, like silly sentimentality;
But, when I see you, the Sun appears; its rays
Spreading warmth through my soul; a quantity
Of joy absent for decades; sparking light
In a spirit abandoned to darkness.
Your grace kindles desire and delight;
Arousing love lost in a wilderness,
Frozen near to death – now granted new life.
Dare I hope for ecstasy? While the head
Urges caution, my heart has forgot strife –
Seeking a future of passion instead.
   Despite the past, affection’s embers glow;
   Requite my care, and make this fire grow.

Tempus Fugit

By Bud Koenemund

In consciousness rises the poet’s plight:

Cursed with knowing time is fleeting; slipping

Past; each moment another dying light;

As, from our birth, those flames are flickering.

Days lost become years; progressing quickly,

Faded and forgotten; surrendered to

Accelerating relativity,

‘Fore the call of skills neglected renews.

Imagination yearns for expression,

And – as this journey hastens toward its end –

A stab at immortality; Passion

Racing the doom we cannot comprehend.

   Crafting perfection is my endeavor;

   Some scrap of verse that will live forever.

It Comes at Night

By Bud Koenemund

It comes at night, when I am defenseless.
Black and amorphous, lurking beyond sight;
Yet crushing: enveloping the senses
In fear. Doubt paralyzes, inviting
A surrender I would willingly give.
This unnamed dread – spirit malicious –
Abuses intellect, holding captive
Reason as my own mind becomes seditious;
Left vulnerable to shadows and ghosts –
Specters of depression which mock defeats,
Real or imagined, while I suffer; lost
As thoughts betray: embracing light’s retreat.
   Despair creeps, growing stronger in this gloom,
   Enticing me ever closer to doom.

By Your Inspiration

By Bud Koenemund

For Lindsay

I am, too often, deficient in speech;

Struck silent by the war ‘twixt intellect

And passion; seeking language that would reach

Your heart; confessions I pray might connect

Our souls; striving to express desire,

While pledging the respect of innocence.

Though my rhymes are feeble, I must admire

Thy beauty, and compliment elegance.

Muse, thou art more deserving of esteem

Than any who treads upon the base Earth

We inhabit. From that grace, like sunbeams,

Words radiate to celebrate love’s worth.

   Be sure such light enkindles creation,

   For this took life by your inspiration.

Light and Darkness

The Brightness of Heaven Outshined

By Bud Koenemund

For Lindsay

What power lies hidden in beauty’s eyes –

Enchanting and mysterious – to seize

My heart; kindling passion undisguised

By modesty? Could any galaxy’s

Stars counterfeit the radiance I find

In those orbs? O, even angels enskied

Must praise the brightness of heaven outshined;

Mere ash compared ‘gainst emeralds rarified.

But, time has cursed me to live in shadow,

Lacking the incandescence of your grace;

And yet, I will stumble forward unbowed,

Desiring thy kiss ere death’s embrace.

   While words can celebrate organs of sight,

   These verses pale in your eternal light.

Frankenstein

By Bud Koenemund

“I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine

and rage the likes of which you would not believe.”

– Mary Shelley

There is, too oft’, a war within my mind;

‘Twixt Good and Evil; the Dark Side and Light;

Intellect struggling to resist blind

Ignorance as shadows obscure the right.

Like poison unchecked, discontent infects

My soul, arousing inhumanity;

A monster existing disaffected

Toward empathy, risking insanity.

Why must I continue this conflict ‘gainst

Self, denied solace in another’s hand;

Some being like me to re-kindle sense,

Restore hope, and grant ease from life’s demands?

   Solitude only nourishes my rage,

   And bitterness grows as love dies away.

Love: 1998 - 2016 (Part VI: Freedom)

By Bud Koenemund

For "Her."

Shall a heart incandescent with love be

Consumed by hate? Must one choke the other –

Torment equaling passion’s quantity –

‘Til embers of desire are smothered;

Expiring sans wisp, ash, smoke, or rack –

Token corporeal to signify

Its extinction? Ignored, fervor turns black,

Eclipsing all that light once beautified.

Respect died in a doppelganger’s eye;

Could I not see myself mirrored in him?

Recalling what might have been magnified

My grief, but catharsis yielded freedom.

   Two decades lost can never be regained,

   Though affection lives again unconstrained.

Silhouette

By Bud Koenemund

(Note: This sonnet was inspired by a photograph. I have not yet obtained permission to post that. When I do, I will add it.)

For Kristen Brownell

Poets worship beauty between rhymes too

Ethereal – they diminish quickly

When delivered by those praising a muse

On pages stained with verse impolitic.

‘Tis certain heaven abides in the way

A body moves – that holy temptation

Created as breasts jiggle and hips sway –

Enticing mortals to risk damnation.

Though attraction is oft’ obscured by sight –

Passion fueled by the lust for short-lived grace –

Love can flourish between shadow and light,

Binding two forever as souls embrace.

   Not seeing, I find what my eyes neglect

   Hidden in the truth of your silhouette.

Passion as Penance

By Bud Koenemund

For "Her."

Is inspiration truly worth my soul?

Enduring an eternity of pain

In exchange for rhymes which cannot console

A poet who pursues his muse in vain?

I wish, Dark Lady, I could say you are

Dead to me. Utter the words – and mean them –

As if my will would extinguish a star.

But, your light blazes, and lost love condemns

The mind; infecting slumber with visions

Of thy face; deceiving every sense;

Permitting the devil visitation:

An ambush sans corporeal presence.

   Your mem’ry lives, arousing emotion:

   Passion as penance to seed creation.

What's in a Name?

By Bud Koenemund

For "Her."

Thy name, which I worshiped ‘bove all others –
Goddess of my idolatry – a prayer
Once whispered in reverence, has smothered
Piety, like a fire denied air.
Beauty exalted; enskied by angel’s
Voices; celebrated in the Heavens;
That word, so pure and sacred, now doth quell
My life, leaving a faithful soul riven.
And, even as fragments struggle toward light,
Betrayal drags me deeper into Hell,
Unleashing horrors; such harrowing sights
None, save perhaps Alighieri, can tell.
   “Her” – my Dark Lady – will as muse endure,
   Though ‘gainst deception I remain inured.

Muse No More

By Bud Koenemund

For "Her."

You were the brightest light in a Heaven
Of stars – one whose brilliance outlasted morn.
Thy invention made my garden Eden;
A paradise somehow fashioned of worn
Rhymes. Indeed, so oft' did thoughts of you guide
My pen, the world might presume you poet,
And I mere scrivener. Within thy eyes
Lived all my words, and in those words the debt
I'll e'er owe thee. But, deceit lay coiled
In this oasis – neglect at its side.
By one, trust will only molder to spoil;
By the other's poison, affection dies.
   Thy graces with quill I did long adore,
   Though, for want of truth, thou art muse no more.

The Heart as Icarus

For Amy Lynn Watkins

The heart as Icarus soars toward the sun
Of our desires. But, blind to hazard,
Love so often tumbles from light to dun;
Leaving all – mind, body, and soul – battered.
Dicing 'gainst the Gods, we strive to escape
This fate; yearning for flight beyond our dreams.
Sadly, we find that we are poor in shape –
Requiring wings in such airy streams.
Words stand impotent – overwhelmed by clouds
Of loss – never healing our wounded pride.
Yet, even through the darkness of this shroud
Strong hearts will rise to seek a love enskied.
Though now it seems tears cannot be restrained,
'Tis certain, time will melt away our pain.

Damn'd Cupid has Forever Cursed Me

For "Her."

Damn’d Cupid has forever cursed me
To dote on imperfection’s perfection;
With my eye to admire her beauty,
While my heart bleeds, battered by rejection;
The Archer’s arrow easily pierced my breast,
Though she, to love’s wound, was proof’d it seems.
Now visions of joy have been smashed to dust,
And the failures suffered infect my dreams;
Am I thus condemned to crawl in darkness,
The blind victim in this malicious hoax;
Destined to be consumed by emptiness,
And forever doomed to pursue her ghost?
Oh, impious devil, pity my plight;
Release my heart that I may turn to light.

Love, of You, I Desire a Favor

For "Her."

Love, of you, I desire a favor;
A tattered scarf or a plain strip of lace.
Some gift to sustain me when I waver;
A light to lead me from the darkest place;
I beg some physical inspiration,
A forgotten cloth that still holds your scent.
Some token to fire imagination,
And jolt my brain when my dreams are all spent;
What I wish is only a trifle, yes;
A simple item that you’ll never miss.
This lifeless object I need, I confess,
To comfort me when I can’t have your kiss.
My Lady, I humbly pray for your love
To all the bright stars in heaven above.