Shadows Whisper From The Lips Of The Cave Poem by Robert Rorabeck

When I begin to pass away
and the strange skin upon these bones
tingles with warning, I turn my eyes
toward the edge of the cave, to where
the figures keep walking, strutting
in show,

and then I begin to eat the
apple in my throat which is the
glorious thing, rising there
the wild sad thing about to
leap from my voice to devour
the world,

but I linger
and I am sad,

And I think about the motions
I put my body through from rest
to motion, the subtlty of my
thoughtless control over the golem
staring back at me with these eyes

When out side, I stare timidly
through the blinds and there past
the shivering palm fronds below
the melting staves bled from the
sun, the others like me,
those emoting atomatons move
just like me, then lurch
toward the long great rows of
malls spreading forever forwards
like coffins for titans warned
by the gods. Even afterwards,
they built their homes upon
the bossoming sands of the siren beaches,

teeth that sparkle like eager smiles
waiting to consume those deadly gating
things

And in this fading way all things come
marching ever towards me,
and down into me
where my body moves and does not,
incomplete,
the shadows whisper from the
lips of the cave.