Black Sun Chalice

It is the hour of the small,

white chalice,

The hour when the shade of the house

lengthens 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, A crema like the dust of a star that died before

our birth. 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.

The long, clear silence of the afternoon.