My Soul's Demise Poem by Arnie Hicks

i - guilt
one more tortured soul
midst the multitudinous hordes of unfortunate miscreants,
mine is a gift of the very real,
and ultimately judicious, phenomenon of guilt.
i wear it proud,
as both mantle and shroud of unholy remembrances -
talisman and testimony
to past transgressions and sins of omission,
carried loftily
through the predatory fog of remorse and self-reproach;
iconic reminder
of lamentable last chances and profound regret.


ii - betrayal
like the fetid air of purgatory's graceless seduction,
the obligatory winds of relentless denial and negation
culminate in the spontaneous crystallization of the soul's demise,
hastening with unerring nonchalance the final betrayal.