Poetry

Therefore, let it be known that all of the following works were written by Jonathan McNeill on various dates. He owns the rights to all of them, and did them as a service for no one. If you would like to use any part of these works you are required by law and conscience to contact Jonathan McNeill and obtain his permission. To contact Mr. McNeill send an e-mail to finalrain@hotmail.com

I can hear the cars on a country highway, all the world is still but them. Their mournful plea sounding as if the world were one giant hollow crater designed to echo their lonely wail. On silent, cold nights like these, the house fills with an eerie feel, together the eight of us are alone. We're stuck amongst our own feeble existence, as if none other existed but our own. Our own solitary wants needs and desires. But when our slumber is broken by the dawn of a new day, we once again put our personhood aside and serve "the greater good." What makes the night so lonely, perhaps the need to be held on these cold dark nights, perhaps one too many a tale of a weary traveler dying in sight of shelter, on a night just like this. Or maybe the cold reminds us of our own needs, but all this aside, it is still lonely. My heart yearns for another as yet, it is still a lonely night.

I awoke to the sun full in my eyes
A little stiff at first, but soon ready
The sun was high on a ice-blue sky
I felt the earth around me fall
To see nothing but the blue of sky and red of sun, I can fly
I feel remorse over the loss of my former days
The days before were nothing to compared to this
I don't understand my own regret
Why would I want the troubles of my ground-dwelling days again?
Would I chose painful ignorance over freedom?
Yet I stoop to the familiar depths and play in the dirt
Rise again and use my wings, leave this dust behind

pen scratch, ink flow, hold fast this moment in time
let no one forget the pains and joys held in it
our mistakes and deeds wrought forever on this page
as long as it stands the weathering feeble hands may bring
if there is joy in this moment, may reading this bring it again
if these memories make us cringe, may this reading teach us these lessons again.

Every moment pelts my soul like hail, taunting and terrorizing me, to be eaten away like the old buildings that stand no more. The attacks and the compromise eat away at me.

The cares of this world wage a war for my attentions, and those who wage the war have no casualties. Stress and the expectations of others reign supreme, they make the rules of war. I am merely the flag on the tug rope, dragged from left to right, all the more. I am chained to a wall and made to listen to my enemies' taunts, battle cries, and shrieks of laughter. I would that it would all go away, leave me in an open field, and let me find peace, find the voice of my maker. As it is, I must become another, to join my enemies in their tugging, but in a new direction, my direction, toward the voice of my God, who's voice I fear I've lost. I long for the day when all these pulling masses will be so easily removed, and I will be free from obstruction, my ears unclogged, hearing only my saviour's voice.

Once I wove a dream, a dream in coloured yarn, at the start of every row the moths ate every day,
And time and red were shades in cloth, I wove these shades of gray,
I sat there weaving, spinning every thread, plotting end of mind
Things that'd happened just a day before, I've forgotten for all time
Moments old and vivid rang forever in the mind, unentered speculation, all forever mine

Said the old maid: "Spill you not the grain," and it was gathered in, just as is the same.
Lifting worlds from all that is despised, thus these dreams shift hues upon the blind.
The bell rings au contraire, beginning mute and ending in a clang,
It graces slumber with omnipresent medley, my heart beats glad to an ever present song:
"Dreams and colours, times and fears, red blood, green time; open end and unclosed mind."

[ The following is an experiment, please don't kill me ]

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
My heart was once aflow with grace and kindness.
After many years of love, my cherished one has died.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
In a grave at the base of the winter hill, I laid my love to rest.
After I covered her grave in the dirt taken from it, I covered it in snow.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
These many years since, I have found my heart is long gone.
Buried in the snow alongside my love.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
Alas, my heart has not been found by girl or bird or season.
My heart has not yet been found by even me.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
This day, my heart lept, and I knew it had returned.
A young bird had fallen from the sky, and was squeeking on my hill.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
I placed the bird in my jacket, which I'd taken from my hide.
The winter cold threatened me with sickness, but I loved the bird.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
I brought the bird into my house, and made her warm,
By the fire bright, I warmed her wings and fed her stomach.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
For many days, I cared for the bird, 'til she could fly.
When she left I thought I would die.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
As the bird flew, I saw some one in the distance,
I saw my true love, as young as many summers before.

I live in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.
She took me by the hand, and together we left this life,
We left the hill of Neter Cason, and left life.

I lived in solace on the winter hill of Neter Cason.

I used to love a girl, who looked a lot like you
She'd comb my hair, kiss my lips, and sing the morning dew
Her skin was smooth as porceline, as cold as ice's beauty
Her love was bitter drink, and the pain I felt was due me
In the waning afternoon light, her hair would shine translucent hues
I'd wake in beds of roses, to cuts and scrapes and bruises
So I'll empty my glass, and let the pain dissolve
Knowing that it's not around her that my world revolves
I left her in a summer meadow, not too far from here
Stood like a metal statue, so no one could free 'er
She wouldn't move an inch, except to hurt me
Since she couldn't, this is where her home would be
But in the dark hues of night, I thought I saw trouble
Her face in faint reflections of a window or a puddle
She chased me with every step I took
When I saw her face, she'd give me that look
I went back to the meadow, now in winter's finest white
I went to where she stood, a still statue in the light
She asked me if I'd came to take her again
I told her never, it would be all the same

"Then why do you come here?" she asked in tears.
"You haunt me in the nights, and live in all my fears."
She laughed and said, "You'll never be rid of me,
I'll always be there, reminding you of we . . ."
Her laughter has stayed with me for many miles
I heard it in the turn of radio dials
But, now I'm here, and you're here, and you look a lot like her
Who are you? What are you? It's at these things I wonder.
Your visage, though pleasant and refined, is bitter pain
For the mem'ries of another, I fear you'll be the same.
You take my hand and with it you caress your face,
With that simple gesture, my fears are erased.
Though my fears are now gone, my questions stay
To look at you, and know you're not her, can I be sane?
I push this thought, and any others, from my mind
I will not forsake what happiness I can find
For the memory of a cruel girl with beautious frame.
Your face, however similar, comes with another name.
A different name, a different spirit, warm and enchanting
Enchant me, love, let me forget the old witch's sting.

My sanctum is invaded by barbarous soldiers
                                who run through all my thoughts
                                                boxed bagged and glued

They hit me where & when it hurts the most
                                kick me in & spit on me though I rest
                                                tortured hacked and bruised

Who are they when they mock & hurt me so
                                when will they leave me be
                                                alone to roam and breathe

Awake not asleep in the nights sweet relief
                                the union of loneliness and joy
                                                left peace and silence

The moon cries for you m'dear
My wolven brethren and I watch
Watch and howl at the moon that cries
Mourning on voices at the silver sliver

Sorrow fills our voices, all for you m'dear
Other flowers wilt, only you are mourned
Though eagles are in their nests above
Even they cannot forget your tears

Oh for childen days with pain but a word
Now it's so real, the old thoughts seem pure folly
Swords never drew blood like our days draw spirit pain
True blood they've spilled, not the blood of skins but soul

looking on the ground's edge, as I ever do
searching here or there for a trace of you
spent so many years longing to be whole
peering at the ocean for a sympathetic soul

loneliness is the song my heart plays
and it's been repeated all my days
i am seclusion's chief musician
not through love, but in repetition

wish i could connect on a simple whim
to the heart i know you hold within
to know the sweetness of your face
and the heaven held in your embrace

its purgatory waiting, never knowing
if angels (like you) can ever see their wings
hell's image is ingrained in life here
and everything meaningless without you near

wish i had a dime (for every dirty whining face
hiding malice cold deceit in unrelenting eyes),
sword or two (to keep at bay sharp nails
embedded all too often in the soft flesh of my soul)

wish i could buy penintence in their hearts
(dark and hateful things they fill with fears),
a place to run and hide (from lies and pain,
creatures haunting me in the harsh day's light)

since true wishing wells are seldom found
i plant my face (prayerfully) before your throne
asking for reprieve from curses (sleepless nights,
luckless days, and hateful people) over me

Teapots, kettles,
Broken rings, and nettles
Summer childhood swings
And other oh so common things

Witherings, everywhere, made by the heat
Blazing flames consuming the wheat

I have been captured
All else have been enraptured
By thoughts of betterment
And of pains that would relent

Wanderings teach me to see
In everything the core of beauty

Sacred ground, healing rain,
A world once sane,
Now grown in emptiness
And so threatens to surpress

Wonderings have poisoned my thoughts
Making me think of all that ought

Justice, equality,
An end to frivolity
Myths I make myself
The ones I leave up on the shelf

the sun peaks over the horizon
and the burning in my eyes is on
the fires of life and shadows meet
beneath the clouds, in to the heat

i sought a little shelter in the shade
and here ten days or more i've laid
fiery sand kisses feet with sharpened corners
turning all of us in to the mourners

the thorns grow up to meet my path
making my shelter become a trap
awaken to the wrath of hidden things
the land where wretched smiles in beauty sings

I'm an inch from tears at every moment,
Even the smallest thing could start the flow,
My pain and tiredness fight to keep me subdued,
What weight will finally break the dam?
I've walked this far, and I don't see an end to it all, where am I?
Where were my my comforts when the famine came?
How far has my full belly gotten me?
I'm lonely, and the weight of my burden threatens to flatten me.
These battles are constant, where is my rest?
I work all day, and long into the night,
all but my few, cut-short dreams are haunted by the pain
Only in my dreams do I find rest,
and even these are pushed away all too soon by my attackers.
How much longer? How many more miles to go?
I don't know if I can make it ...
before I'm broken.

I long for sleep, and I miss the peace it affords.

[Apparently, I've held on to this poem for more than a year without posting it. The answer to the question of the poem? I can make it. Its not necessarily easier, but it helps to have a cause, a reason. A hope is not enough, a hope is a lie I tell myself to get out of bed in the morning. A cause gives my life a purpose, makes the suffering worthwhile.]

If I in solace can embrace
and molten embers do en haste
Open well and in my soul
Give my heart and full control
To evensongs of sparrows' calls
and hide in forest walls.

words on glass cutting hard
and make bleed

work so hard a moment's
rest could do nil to harm
a wayward soul

wishing makes wells grow
deep with tears i fall

float on salted waters
in the whispers of your
name i be

awakened, woken, dreaming; in
sands of window broken

it's true that like likes like?
and bizarre? adores
grotesque

if i laugh, i tell a lie
that whispers not to worry
i cry every tear into the dark
--this too is deception
falsehood-- in words or deed,
it means the same
this-- the only mask i own
--tight stretched grin
a gleam in glass eyes
--hiding pain deep in glaze
dying eyes if you could see
the truth beneath the mask
do we only live to rot?
this can't be true
but so hard to believe
when rotting's all i seem to do

words, just words
scattered in black on white
and the clothes they wore
were old with fires
of ancient days forgotten

i am alive they said
and cried into the night
remember us our children
don't forget our paths
we see the cliffs ahead

but the words have no speech
if some soul reads
and their children do not
they're brought to life
for the memory of a thought

and we plunge we children
progeny of old ideas
dive for the cliffs
avoided sometimes by
the eyes of elders long dead

words ... only words.

I think that I could stand to wake
	If you were by my side
To face the barren fact of life
	its emptiness entire
Morning bears such deadly treats
	and forces them upon me
First light brings aweful dread
	continual sweat and pain
But if you were here, I think ...
	I might arise, throw back
All that muddles, covers, blends.
	and those who anger, stare
They're left holding only part of me
	(the wretched part that longs
To join them and their fury)
	this evil in their hands.
All that remains of me, in your arms
	held sweetly in your tears
But I wait, your space is empty
	for so long it's cold
If you were by my side, I think
	That I could stand to wake