The Book of Dead Names (sonnet trilogy)
The Book of Dead Names
Sonnet Trilogy by Sara Russell, 29/4/07</p>
Introduction
Burning pages
Blood-red sky
Rage of angels
Days gone by
The Chosen one, with eyes of searing flames
Is opening the book of Living Names....
I
The turning pages tell of lives gone by,
Furled by the one whose eyes are blinding flames;
Hot ashes flutter to the blood-red sky,
Like burning souls of undeserving names.
Where justice fails in life, death compensates:
Rare Mercy brings the angel who redeems,
While cruelty brings down avenging fates,
Even if conscience sleeps throughout our dreams.
The one with eyes of flame sees everything,
His Book of Living Names is always fair;
Yet every page frail as a fledgeling's wing -
Tread carefully if your name is not there.
There are but two volumes: one leads to light,
The other leads to Hell, without respite.
II
He sat in shadows, working through the night;
A scribe writing in words of bloody red,
While brass lanterns imparted sickly light,
As nightmare voices raged inside his head.
And all the names of those forever doomed,
Of future deaths and those of ancient past,
Were on the page, committed and entombed
In holy blood, scarlet and colour-fast.
All those whom God shall cast into the flames,
Unworthy of Heaven's forgiving grace
Are ever here, in this Book of Dead Names -
Named, numbered souls, each one bereft of face.
Thus, all enjoying notoriety
Shall be vanquished in anonymity.
III
Place copper coins over these weary eyes,
Gather my gold around me in the tomb,
Pray overlook transgression, all my lies,
Cradle me unto death, as from the womb.
Bury my silver at my lifeless feet,
Burn sandalwood, utter my name in prayer,
Drench me with nard and hyssop, bittersweet,
Remember me with lilies in my hair.
Pray write me in the Book of Living Names,
God turn thy face from my iniquity;
Spare me the flail, the pit of raging flames,
But let the quiet waters carry me.
Float me upon the Styx when I am gone;
Erase me from the Necronomicon.
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NOTES:
This was inspired by some of the startling imagery in The Book of Revelation from the Bible.
The last sonnet is inspired by the parable about it being as easy for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as it is for a "camel to pass through the eye of a needle", hence the references to gold and precious spices.
Dear Sara,
I liked this bunch of poem as well.. There is nothing to comment on the form, language, etc really. Its a beautiful piece of art. Though I would prefer that you be consistent to your style and include some of those gothic looking images as well; adds more drama into it, they do.
I can debate on the content and it will be an ever ending one, so let me refrain from it.. I'm not a very religious person and am happy about it; don't have to worry about hell too much.
But I do sometimes wonder whose hell will I be damned into, since I don't believe in any... LOL... Death to me is a "period" nothing after that and everything about me becomes the past. My memory will be carried forward (though briefly) by people who derived favor from me and may be the photons of light reflected from me and the sound energy generated (converted from some other form of energy to sound) by my vocal cords will remain afloat and travelling somewhere in the Universe for sometime before they convert into other forms of energy and or matter. So far the mass I occupy, some of them will become food, some carbon and the rest into energy (probably mostly heat). Some particles will stick in the inner lining of noses of people who attended my cremation willfully or otherwise.
Thats life. A lot of hard work, so lives destroyed and made, so many hearts touched and broken to end with a period and to be re-assimilated to raw forms of mass and energy only to obey the simple laws of physics.
Keep writing and thank you.
Respectfully,
Amartya
Thanks Amartya! I don't
Thanks Amartya!
I don't really believe that any loving creator god would cast any errant soul into hell, but I find that The Book of Revelation is so dramatic... it has inspired so much from The Omen movie to poems like this one... thanks for commenting. I may do an illustration for this one and add it later.
Best regards,
Sara
Another well written and
Another well written and thought provoking classic
Thanks welshpoet! :)
Thanks welshpoet! :)