Poetry
Event Horizon
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
a symphony of sirens and silence,
grit under fingernails, the grit of lives
lived on the edge of the precipice,
where skyscrapers are tombstones
for the dreams that died within them.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
as shadows stretch long in the twilight,
rats scurry, their teeth glinting
like secrets whispered in alleyways,
echoing in the hollow chambers
of hearts hardened by the rhythm of steel.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
in subway cars that rattle and hum,
where faces, pale and ghostly,
pass like phantoms, eyes glazed
with the weight of unspoken stories,
burdened by the crush of concrete.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
a cauldron of humanity boiling,
beneath the veneer of civility,
lies the raw, the visceral pulse,
of survival in the urban sprawl,
where empathy is a luxury forgotten.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
and I, a solitary figure, walk
through the din of existence,
at each step, a question unanswered,
each breath a stolen moment,
in the relentless march of time.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
yet, in the cracks of the pavement,
I see the persistence of life,
a blade of grass defiant,
a testament to the tenacity,
of hope amidst desolation.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
but in this vast expanse of despair,
there is a strange, haunting beauty,
in the broken, in the lost,
a mirror held to the human condition,
reflecting our shared, fragile truth.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
and in this gnawing, I find
a resonance, a connection,
to the millions of lives entwined,
in the ceaseless, aching struggle,
to find meaning in the chaos.
The city gnaws at the edges of my soul,
and as I stand on this precipice,
staring into the abyss,
I know that in this gnawing,
in this relentless erosion,
lies the essence of what it means to be human.
Ani Eldritch 2024
