• Kellybury Ramblisms
    By Ryan Kelly

    Moon shines on snow in a slow falling path,
    Casting ghost’s light on the town of El Nath.
    A small, sleepy quarter of mock, frozen earth,
    Where legends down settle and women give birth
    To new youth who might uptake the mantle
    And with fire in their eyes
    Ride off to battle—or, perhaps
    If fate deems something other,
    They’re just as likely to stay home with mother.

    Deep in the heart of this ice-town sheltering fire,
    A quaint little circle is built where a pyre
    Once massive in stature, heat and renown,
    Devoured the bodies of those cut down
    Perhaps by age, battle, physical distress,
    Perhaps it would be easy to miss the town confess
    That, deep within its heart, concealed by sleepy snow,
    Like a pendulum passing, strangers will show
    From the strangest of places, to their death
    Where screaming would swallow their very last breath.

    Today we look at a number of such
    Unfortunate souls who have gathered,
    In the darker of corners of this town square
    Where their souls shall be soon diced and quartered.
    A lively inn lively in nothing but sound—
    In the center a spiral goes up and around
    In colorful ribbons of whites and of reds.
    The only thing missing is the presence of heads
    And bodies to go with them—there are but five!
    One is the barman, cooped up in his den,
    Polishing the same glass, again and again.
    Four others—the sacrifice—myself included,
    Gaze somberly within the land we’ve intruded
    Upon each other and the world around,
    Our heads in the clouds as opposed to the ground.
    How we’ve come here, we know little
    Aside from the fact, that we came from behind us
    Fleeing a world that so harshly did mind us.
    Of our previous lives, we leave now abandoned,
    Torn-up, greyed out, and largely disbanded.
    For we are the runners, my reader, you see
    And fleeing our grievances, we seek to be free
    From the pain and the pleasures of life led by rote.
    We’d cut ourselves free from a most stagnant moat
    That most would call living, but oh we digress:
    Their thoughts of living are such great distress!

    But enough of my ramblings, though I guess I can’t help
    Raving on and on, for as an insolent whelp
    I can’t help but glow at the sound of my voice,
    Although, how I like to say, given the choice,
    I might tear out with gusto the source
    Of my singing, like dear Ariel.
    But alas, it continues, my wretched ramblings!
    Ignore me, no—hearken, rather, to more selfless meanderings.


    There was a scholar among us that day,
    His hair was cropped closely and silvery grey.
    With face free of acne, blemish or wart
    His build was set thickly, though stature quite short.
    Two lenses lay thickly upon his nasal bridge
    And when he removed them, still the tell-tale ridge
    Of where the twin glasses once sat persisted,
    The lenses themselves were perpetually misted.
    Though it might be thought scholars, well since days of old
    Had duty to lecture, to spread far the gold
    of his knowledge, the man voiced muted contempt:
    from such a spiteful, stupid rule… surely he must be exempt!
    Who in this world, minds filled with shallow filth, chaos
    Could hope to deserve his revelations—by Dhaos!
    For those who had benefitted him not at all,
    Why should he enlighten them, loosen the shawl
    That he kept with a fervor about his wit
    To aid some mindless, legionnaire s**t?
    The world, he stated, was in such disrepair
    That he simply didn’t bother, didn’t relish to care.
    No students he wanted to stink up his air,
    No hard-earned knowledge he wanted to share
    With any but books, who staved off his gloom:
    The first of us once confined to his room.


    Sitting alone looking sour and bland,
    Another elder was trying his hand
    At the cursed sport of drinking, a surefire repellant
    Of any goodwill, in place of choly melant.
    The man was a father, such that I digress
    The alarm seeing such a man in much distress
    Was an alarming one for me, indeed
    To see that a man who might sow his seed
    Was capable of such a fit of silent despair:
    Small wonder he too had silvering hair.
    His manner lay brusquely, his eyes were grim;
    Perhaps it was his beverage that made him so grim
    And, perhaps as well loose of the tongue
    For he spoke bitter ramblings conjuring thoughts of warm dung.
    He spoke of the missus, always absent for work
    And of consequence, all the pleasures he’d shirk
    To satiate the seething beast of three young children
    And of how he’d play the exasperated warren.
    Always screaming and shouting, the foul brood
    Thinking why he’d birthed them gave him a most foul mood.
    And so it was, that as he excused himself and drank,
    I sat down a moment to contemplate
    How, were I his age, could I possibly hate
    Something I’d taken part to create?

    The third among us was a man of renown,
    Though the very mention of it brought a most unsettling groan
    From the blackened gap set betwixt his lips
    From a stainless steel flask, he took his sips
    Of some foul-scented liquid, to me yet unknown
    Though the others, well over age, might surely have known.
    To his chagrin he revealed his history in industrial rock,
    A fact I was ill-prepared to hide mild shock:
    Not until recently had he obtained transcendence
    From the pack of like-minded, ‘unique independents’.
    Sickly by nature and built like a reed,
    He did not dress darkly and was merry of deed
    Unlike the contenders, or so he claimed:
    Those air-headed fame-mongers had left him ashamed.
    “We may be thought menacing” said he with sad air
    “For the most part it may be true, for who else would dare
    To make music like we make, but the bran of the grain
    Or perhaps those unspeakable seeking capitalistic gain.”
    He was a quiet man, refined and polite,
    Though his body was bent, his eye remained bright
    And his lyrics, though dark, did bring forth a glimmer
    Of a warmer emotion, an ulterior shimmer.
    How strangely, I mouthed, such a man could be modest.
    Surely his mercies amongst us were broadest.

    And finally, dear reader, we arrive upon me,
    Who though, not drunk, might just as well be,
    For in no mind not my own or a drunkards, you see,
    Could one finds thoughts so lacking in lucidity.
    The world is my playground, and yet I confine,
    My frantic activities to a corner of my mind;
    A place where no harm could possibly be done
    To myself or to others—the cost being fun.
    While others have vices, escapes from their fears,
    I grant myself nothing but the hollowest cheers
    Of assertions that one day, all will be made right
    If I fight with conviction, fight the good fight.
    And thus I choose not to list my own interpretations
    Of myself, but rather those common ascertations.
    That I am loose-tongued, loose minded fine fellow;
    That I’m painfully quiet, too consciously mellow.
    A slacker, a no-good, strung up dead end guy;
    That I won’t quite stop moving ‘til the day I day.
    Seraphic incarnation who yields to every rule,
    A contemptuous miscreant who, though a fool
    Will not defy for the sake of defiance,
    Nay—only when I find it foolish—compliance.
    The world is my oyster devoid of a pearl,
    But to deliver true feelings—ugh, I’d sooner hurl
    Than divulge in my spirit, to sully my soul
    For the sake of good mark on rectangular scroll!

    So here we sit in the town of El Nath,
    Quietly awaiting the coming of wrath.
    Though we may not know quite the form it shall take,
    At least we’ll leave knowing we left this world fake.