Island of life O entire island of skin, being unman’d,
not a land where life is home-
A blast from Life!
The endless cannonade of Life, the sundering
cruelty of the world.
Stranded in existence and desert’d to facades-
veils to dignify and purpose us to life,
a guise of death, to be adrift and spot
you in the distance so vegetable,
fructified, denied to me!
Woe to being! O bless the lifted shirt that raised
Atlantis, that I only glimpsed
A moment-
a moment bears the world for life-
The power that it is to land nothingness, cover the
abyss in stones, then crack
The stones, rain in such ferocity and time that
stones are melt to sediments
That tree and proffer leaves to the animals begot
Spontaneously by beauty
O force of god, true god, I fall upon my weak earth
at you, kneel upon the waves
I’m sentenced to in this life where all is water, the
only foundation being found
By you O Beauty, that you crest and stroll and
crown, garden’d diadem,
Roving jewel, Sun’s fire caught in form! I kiss your
sands, the million grains,
The seeds in every fruit, the vegetables I consume!
Sense antheses! To live
On dew? A dream to be so dolphinlike? To flounder
in the freedom of the depths,
Being unbound to the common ground accustomed
to what was
So often wished away for some bizarre, some
bafflement to fulfill the whim,
Adventure, heroics of my heart that yearned for
chasms and chaos to confront
Me! To become a knight against the dragon of the
void, the trolls of oblivion
That malinger at the towers of enchantment,
wielding spiked clubs
And sharpened lances, to ring chaos from the                                                                          
towers, a bell through
The universe whose ringing sets on Night and Day
as eagles and as daws
Dismember gods, unbowel hearts, and ring as a
conscious lightning
That strikes ripping hands pulling Orpheus apart! O
the lyre of my life is smashed!
We’re a foolish music and foolish players to
continue dreaming.
The fire of our days has been doused, Eden’s burnt
and in the clouds!
O music, you, beautiful note that’s rung forever, you,
you, you, a foolish beast
I am to worship you! O my life I cast into the surf,
I am a bottle in search
Of shore, discover me O Muse, along the sands.
Read and play
The melody that I contain!

…

S. T. Brant is a teacher from Las Vegas. 
Pubs in/coming from EcoTheo, Door is a Jar, Santa Clara Review, Rain Taxi, New South, Green Mountains Review, Another Chicago Magazine, Ekstasis, 8 Poems, a few others. 
You can find him on Twitter @terriblebinth or Instagram @shanelemagne.