I.

I offer thanks to the darkness
dressed in a spectacle
of cruel mysticism.

For without the black hearts,
there are no flowers of light.

II.

Praise for Mapplethorpe's lillies
and celebrations of impotence
choked around scrotums
and confirmations
of barbed wire.

He would not turn away from
pierced tongues
of borrowed debauchery
and circumstance.

III.

Let them talk of cypress
and steal diamonds—

The black hole of a face
pretends to suck infinity,
propagate the myth
of madness.

Let them have a thin smile
of satisfaction—

It is hip to be a victim
and practiced in the art
of disturbing.

IV.

When this cacophony
of the overly anxious
dies down...

it is the carnival of the sun
with sweet perfume
and solar flares,

not the trivia of slide shows,
that burns heaviness
from the mind.

V.

Angels appear—
turn shadows inside out.

And, who knows what
is reflected by the rays
bounced off darkness

in smooth radiance,
like some beauty
that cannot be captured?

VI.

In a vortex where hearts join
and eclipse one another
through portents of mystery,

darkness is a canvas
for brilliance and prisms
that favour stars.

I offer thanks to the light—
listen as the heavens open,
and the stones cry out.