Dead Poets’ Legacy

I’ve been stalked by God and Suns
Haunted by wild furies and ghosts
Loved by nature’s shyest beasts
Adored by words slick in subjectivity

I’ve drunk the magic of life
In all her deep-velvet verities
And the fabulous beauty of even
Despair, and the psychic knot of tragedy

I’ve been visited by calamity
Survived through bankrupt bed-ridden
Poverty, seen the ceremony of
Heart-break unfold in slow scrutiny

I’ve loved those conversations
Among the ruins, as if that was also
Part of my destiny, but as a Buddhist
I’ve taken it all in stride, and in a whirlwind

Of havoc and the empathy that comes
After significant suffering, I can only say
I carry with me the legacy of poets
I’ve read carefully those who committed suicide

I’ve felt their prominent warped humanity
And learned from their last grip on romance
I’ve been stalked by Metaphysics and Death
A tentative existentialism…