BYZANTINE LIGHT

every year at summer’s close
the light gets long and white
in youth it only
found me at a loss 
but now I look for it, 
welcome the same wind that blew
the walls of the citadel down

the Gods may know the pain we feel
never being able to reach the top 
of Olympus—
but time is cruel, even to the Gods,
enough to bring
the mountain down

and show us their face,
their bold, celestial eyes
and hands’ immaculate architecture of rock
at the end of summer,
in the end of empire light 
the undeniable shift
when our hearts beat closest 

to the walls of our chest
and love is drawn 
by the ropes of strife
when the last 
twinkling gold 
sun singes to a deeper hue,
a crowning amber 
now corralling clouds like horses 
that gather
and gallop into the dusk. 

SERVING THE RICH DINNER

the moment you've been waiting for
has already arrived
the butterfly got taken down
by a grain of sand
the haves will have more
the have-nots lives only
oblivion’s purchase
the green Earth will blindfold us
clasp a clay hand to our mouths
and the oceans will roll the dice of our bones
the sun is as white as a receipt
stars fall like coins into the
velvet coffer of night
the same law that curates tyranny
is the only thing keeping 
my hands from closing 
around your lily-white neck
Care for more wine?

Singer-songwriter, journalist, and curator of Going For The Throat—a weekly publication of cynicism, outrage, correspondence and romance. Jim Trainer publishes one collection of poetry and prose every year through Yellow Lark Press. Love&Wages is his 5th.  Please visit jimtrainer.net for his collections and for music, film and appearances.