Stream-of-Consciousness Poetry

"Tempest Tides"

The root of Babylon runs deep,
Planted in the minds of Ethos and Bacchus,
Who weave the fabric of the fate's unfolding,
Incarnate of the defiled day.

One red star guides the black magi,
To the New City of Hister in the American land,
Where painted pictures of the future reconnect,
To forge the gateway to Lucifer's cradle.
Unlight casts bright shadows on the eyes of young children,
 
Dancing to a song of Mars,
Juno arranged for her own amusement,
To spite Zeus in his unreal halls of lust and envy.

Capital sin becomes a witches playground,
Buried in Merlin's sandy cove,

Realized in the bleeding martyr called Joshua,
Who pays the price with every season of the Sun.

Nine times nine the Moon god sings,
Nestled in his sinking home,
Tortured by the Tempest's test,

Dylan Zimmerman forged long ago.

-John Evans and Brandon Young

The Midnight Vale: Poems by John Evans

  Ascension to Paradise

Out of the aching nightmare I am reaching,

Searching for a silver gate,

Beyond time’s chain cold and unfathomable,

Preserved for eternity by God’s good grace.

I feel myself slowly drifting,

Like a leaf on some deep stream,

Shining with a thousand precious colors,

Richer than those life imitates.

Beyond me lie fields of virgin grass,

And mountains taller than mortal peaks,

Crowned by palaces amongst the stars,

Steeped in golden mystery.

I float upon the amber air,

And through the gate my conscience earned,

Until I land in my familiar form,

Dressed in clean silk whiter than snow.

Here she finds me in thoughtful repose,

A woman with fare emerald eyes

Who peers inside my living soul,

And cleanses sin’s bitter grief.

She calls my name in a knowing way,

Absolving me of fear,

And with her stainless hand guides me hence,

From that blossoming orchard. 

John Evans is a 19-year old student of Medieval History and Literature at Manhattan College in New York City who is a writer for "Legendarium" a Tolkien fandom website and much more and has a book of poems (published soon) called "The Midnight Vale." He is also author of "All The Best Things"  (click for the link) a suspenseful tale of love and betrayal among a group of young musicians playing in Hudson Valley, New York. All The Best Things chronicles the struggles of a blind musician, torn between the love for his craft and the love of another. John also is a dear friend and is part of my Tolkien Archaeology collection on Sir Gawain and The Green Knight and can be found with me on The Silmarillion Seminar podcast with The Tolkien Professor. In our "many meetings" we have spent countless hours waxing philosophic. If I had one intellectual heir, it would be John Evans. 

Poetry of John Evans

Gustave Doré - ”Wood of the Suicides” 
Illustration from Dante’s Inferno, Canto 13 . (c.1861)

Muses on a wooded hollow
by John Evans
Beneath the tall elm tree where the shadow grows,
 
I sat and pondered in silent distress,
Admitting my faults to the wordless hollow,
 
Confessing my mind to a glade of wild grass.
No visitor stirred my solemn retreat,
Or bothered to mark me on their journey hence,
Save the creatures of that timeless wood,
And the memories that haunted my heated brain.
 
I thought I saw a prowling wolf,
With a coat of fur blacker than pitch,
And eyes that twinkled with a subtle rage,
Ere departing for his horrid hunt.

 
I thought I heard a nightingale sing,
In a voice like sunshine on the rugged earth,
Soothing the dull pain contemplation brings,
And life's misfortunes rightly earned.
 
I thought I felt a spirit pass,
Through my body in a gentle breeze,
Along the highways of the air,
Far above the thorny green.
 
I know not from whence it came,
Or of what kind it was before,
In bygone worlds the druid's praised,
In mystic omens their magic wove.
 
Thus I staggered from that forgotten place,
And traversed the chartless miles home,
Reckoning little of what I had witnessed,
 
Beneath the tall elm tree where the shadow grows.