Sandcastles

I dwell with the saints but dream with the sinners.

I praise the pious but pursue the philistine.

In the catalogues of virtues I count my tempers —

systematically stocked according to their merit.

Neat, sharp to eye — offered freely by the mind.

But as that unfounded foundation falters,

so too do my perjured plans.

Do they see? Oh the blessed redeemed?

Through the restless ruin of my fallen altar.

Would they speak if they did?

Wisdom?

Truth?

That those as a sanctified refrain would fall upon my ear.

Silence? Silence.

Silence speaks more than any sacred soliloquy I know.

That this, too, must be our lot —

childs’ whims that inhabit castles of sand.

and when collapsed by wind, wave, and wanton cudgel,

to collect the fallen memories of glass and gold and glory of old,

And begin again.

Until such time as time is such for harvest,

Sisyphus and I, hand in hand, up the hill again.