To become the spectator of one’s own life[…]is to escape the suffering of life.
          —Wilde¹

                    i. Eros

Where a fondness develops falls
drop upon drop this mouth wanting
to touch lips its tongue recoils from,
knowing too well it cannot, not
in public. Oiled with resentment’s
grease only desire’s rituals
can turn from bitter to sweet, how

                    ii. Philia

language fails to mirror well what
ought to be felt, if not said. Culled
till expressionless and weak, kill
this thing before it speaks evils,
makes believe in blasphemies none
other than reticent priests all
versed already in keeping some

                    iii. Ludus

saints’ feasts left unmentionable
in their liturgy. Our brethren
martyrs this want of ours often
dishonours, this ravenous, got-
to-have-it no-matter-the-cost
hunger for another gospel
which others call indecency.

                    iv. Agape

The good news of this getting caught
in heresy feels more real
to me than their conspiracy
when those who profane its temple’s
claims to sanctity strain blossoms
to reveal what, under the seal
of the rose, are those feasts’ maxims

                    v. Pragma

never meant for sin’s casual
confessional, words which normal
dinner table conversation
prefers to censor until naught
comes to pass, for no one answers
for hurts done in the past. A tall
order, this love of ours nameless

                    vi. Philautia

avengers fill, angels allot
more effort to killing off all
thoughts of it than god does to heal
what craving creates this hole skulls
bleed from, makes us whole, this flotsam
our minds jettison when unsealed
since being silenced makes it come.

__________
¹Oscar Wilde, “Chapter 9”, Dorian Gray quoting Lord Henry “Harry” Wotton to Basil Hallward, in The Picture of Dorian Gray: With an Introduction and Classic and Contemporary Criticism: Edited by Joseph Pearce, published at San Francisco by Ignatius Press in 2008; page 117.