Beneath our tattered cloaks, the sun's own creche,
Obscure within the only form we know
Yields hints of what our eyes will never show:
Time, space and matter form a knotted mesh.
They've beat us (slowly) to the depths of flesh,
Ripped fiercely from our rainbows, blow by blow.
With our own blood, the starry cosmos starts—
Songbirds, streaked red by cycles of rebirth,
They fly and shriek with bare-restrainèd mirth.
But we in death alone escape our hearts,
For deserts harsh stretch through our inner parts—
Mirage of founts that cannot quench our thirst.
Amid our own, we dare not show our tears,
But whisper, each to each, in shuttered ears.