I drift from visions.
The void within which I languish
Remained vast, but now seemed navigable.
I discern a structure, enormous in scale.
Just on the cusp of my perceptions, but within reach.
With impetuous spirit, I claw toward its distant silhouette.
It is a temple of all that was.
Imperfect in its construction, but robust,
And equipped to weather the endless storms beyond.
Its ceiling stretching off above me to dizzying heights...
Wind and storm howl at the entrance, and I am forced to take shelter.
At its centre, the fools eat hearty,
From suppers of glazed meat and wax fruit.
Beheld as still life, but empty within.
Aggrandizement the sole nutrient, and ritual in place of satiety.
Their garbs,
Luminescent in gold and diamond, hid their forms from my sight.
Yet I sense them.
At their core, a nebulous lust radiates.
Khyphotic and swollen, their disdainful forms hunch over the table.
For seeming eons,
I watched their tapestry race skyward, adorned with stammering words.
Decreed in mangled tongues,
The fools declared their suzerainty of this ancient place.
Unearned misunderstood, their crowns of tin shone in empty eyes.
Delirious in mania, their feasts would adjourn with all principles
And elements,
And all that was great and true, heaped in the pestle and mortar.
With glee, they would grind the contents to
Powder and silt, before strewing to the still air.
I witnessed them take up arms to hammer at the foot
Of the columns that buttress the great stone roof above.
In shrieking psychosis,
Their hooded forms smashed and chipped for
Endless hours, until exhaustion stayed their hammers.