I left my home far behind, waved good-bye to my routine One dusky hour's drive north I rode in man's machine Someplace in north's wood I felt that I would find "There lies your reputation And an honest measure of your worth" This I have sought in quest Since my long gone birth Battling with my beasties Has brought me to a truth The sweeter the tongue, The sharper the tooth I stepped forth on the Mother In my search for light Forgotten church to my left, The mansion to my right Light showed through the windows Of the house that I have known So I had made this my guest, The scars of dusk had blown There's a man who carries his dreams In a bag slung over his shoulder No word could you understand, His bundleis as life's boulders So he bags his regrets Into a bundle of sorrow And carries them in hope, The hope of tomorrow I left my bag out of sight And sat by candle-light Then I saw an apparition, Much to my own fright I saw a compound Of all that is unclean Abnormal, detestable, The worst that I have seen The ghoulish shade of decay, Putrid and antique Unwholesome revelation, All that is bleak A travesty of human shape Upon bones of mold Clothing disintegrating, The stench of the old I know what I am, I am what I am I stared into the gla**y orbs Which stared back at me Then I had found my peace, I had found the key I reached to touch the carrion And it reached from the ma** To reveal to my fingers Cold polished gla**! We tipped our hats Good-Eve to the other Picked up our bags, Waved good-bye to our brother We'll find the speck Of truth in each riddle And a looking-gla** Stuck in the middle Wise one is master of the mind, Fool will be it's slave Me, I'm in the middle, Only a mirror, only a riddle Imagine the dark obscure poet Gliding through his night Pausing to stare in from the out. He would enter, but outside he is lord Imagine the pure beyond holy and evil, Watching, trying every extreme With the calm knowledge That he is colour and dance and saying, "There is no Renaissance, Only the ancients creating different lights"