Shadowbox Dragons

It's on his shortlist to adapt to music with his band The Gods of Love. It is one of the most commented upon poems from his latest collection, RONIN IN THE TEMPLE OF APHRODITE. A theme of exercise of will leading, if not to personal redemption, at least to the fulfillment of purpose. The notion of finally walking away from the wreckage of failed promise and embracing something loftier, more beautiful, more true.

Shadowbox Dragons

I used to wait
by the gate
reliant on my own defiant energy
and patient for the epiphanies
that not everyone is dealt
to the felt of the casino of life.

and eventually.
eventually.
I lose faith in my projected shadows
as the grey lights barely touch me
anymore, sore from a thousand aging scars
earned in burned fingertips.

but resolutions bring
revolutions
if you are sincere and fear nothing
but the stagnancy of memories made
in the sheltered corners of recollection
in a boneyard where I once stood guard.

I am tired of waiting
waiting for
things that maybe never were to begin with
and now are shadowbox dragons
to be feared only by the ignorant
who believe their own mythologies.

like a disease
only dreamt
and you wake up. whole. and in control
of what was, or could have been, or should have been
a question quested and tested
and eventually bested by the better judgements.

so I place my hands
on the gates
and press outward, feeling the hinges groan
as they do what they were built to do.
as I have done. and now, it is time for new adventures
away from the stench of the boneyard of memory.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.