

It is the hour
of the small, white chalice,
The hour when the shade of the house leans toward the soul.
Behold: the scorched bean,
the nocturnal seed of the abyss,
Has surrendered its ghost to the iron heart of the furnace.
Under the terrible weight of a thousand sighs— This pressure of years,
this silver breath of the machine—
The
essence is
wept into the light.
See how it descends, a
viscous ribbon of ancient
time, Darker than the memory of a
king, Yet crowned with a veil of ephemeral gold,
Is it a drink,
or a prayer in the language of soot?
I hold this tiny vessel of solitude against the cold.
It is the bitter syrup of the earth’s own wakefulness,
A concentrated lightning that does not strike,
but infuses
The tired blood with the phantom of a lost vitality.
One sip: and the fog of the hallway recedes,
The forgotten names of childhood stir in the dregs,
And for a fleeting moment,
the heart is a clock
That beats in time with the primordial furnace.
Oh, brief and burning truth!
A black sun held between the thumb and the finger,
Disappearing before the steam can tell its tale,
Leaving only the scent of a burnt kingdom
And the long, clear silence of the afternoon.