Chronicles of Charon by Zay Pareltheon
Zay Pareltheon
All work was originally published at Scrittura on Medium. Thanks, friends. Illustrations from Gustave Dore are in the public domain. All others are credited. Copyright - Zay Pareltheon 2020
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Chronicles of Charon
Contents Oh Phegylas
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We Need Some Help
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Sardonis, Sit By Me
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Elysian Days
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Thunderstorms
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Rank is of LIttle Worth
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Those Gods Rail
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Palliate the Grief
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Traded in the Public Trust
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The Gods Remain Aloof
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Grab Those Books
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Skiff of Death
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Pandemic of Profiteering
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Age Does Not Erase
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Please Explain
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If Anyone Knows
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This Kant Guy
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I Remember Dante
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I'll Be Damned
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By Jove and Jesus Too
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Decorum Dictates
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Anagnorisis Please
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Oh Phegylas
Oh, Phegylas, it's almost good to see you, And maybe I've grown accustomed to that Singed hair and blackened scalp of yours. Why in Hecate’s name or strong Zues’ shame Did you ever think revenge on gods would work? But, I think you need some help, not because of age, That joy denied us both. The throngs are pressing on, And on each return the shores and hills are thick With those who pay a hefty fee for transport, Dragging phalanges in the Styx to un-recall. It's small consolation to speed up boarding No ending for inconsolable losses of the plague But perhaps, I wonder here, if we might help Assuage the grief of those who died alone.
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We Need Some Help
So, Phlegylas, we both know we need some help The rage for passage presses on despite the fee And we have an appointed task to collect To ferry distracted souls to the other side So they might forget sweet foods and sweeter love. Sardonis then will join us now - a team To ferry efficiently, solvently, A corporation for death’s passage. And he mixes up such a brew of tea For passengers as they face the edge. In times of trouble we need some help The argument just - just no argument From gods who witness this conflagration Of the lost and leaderless facing ends.
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Sardonis, Sit by Me
Sardonis, please sit here a bit with me Here, on the quay’s edge. I know you enjoy edges Like those on cliffs from which your tribe often push The old, infirm, and dying - that's why you Face death with such a grin - almost a friend. Look, your brew of tea is working very well Already somnambulant, nearly still, Now they chitter chatter like old school buds, Pay Phegylas, shuffle aboard, and bide the ride It's no party boat, but they talk and I attend. Men alone can end a war despite the costs But only gods can grant the fleeting wisdom To end this plague that sends us customers And such profits - a friendly proposition deal, arrangement, yes?
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Elysian Days
Damn, the Elysian Days are here at last. We have two weeks of longer brighter days When skies are so blue they just might crack And let the darkness fall to further crush What little joy we find in our too somber work. They continue arrival, like emptiness, Spaces, pauses, nothings in between And motion toward the shore carries on Relentlessly - Sisyphus has it easy - I think Phegylas, push on, but a question plagues me. Will this ever end? Phegylas and Sardonis, It’s not an ending that we seek to somehow sit Idly in Elysian days and drink wine by the Styx, But we could use space among desperations.
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Thunderstorms
Thunderstorms? In Elysian days? What the hell? No pun intended Phylegyas, but this light Doesn't last too too long before going dark When night exerts its perpetuity And I've been poling back and forth for weeks. Those souls, ah clients, who pay the fair share, The price for transport to the other side At least I see them well in longer days The better light reveals the anguish, pain, Of the breath cut off by disease or force. Phegylas, I've only this request this week. Let's shed light on victims, those deserving, But steer ranting decorum flaunters backwards To join the fat slack-jawed power mongers - waiting.
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Rank is of LIttle Worth
Phegylas and Sardonis , listen up Rank is of little worth in hell; we know The rich can carry on, with little worth And Apollo knows this line lengthens now With every passing day - every passing life. But, attend to this, rumors abound now One Floyd will amber down the trail, stopping To catch a breath, to shrug off heavy weight To ask for his dead mother's whereabouts He’s a victim, an oppressor’s repressed. Give him place and way, move others aside. I'll ferry him directly, no charge here. Disease takes so many before their time, But there's just no plague like bad leadership.
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Those Gods Rail Look, I get it. I'm not paid to think that much. They leave that for brighter folks - Apollo. I just collect my dues and pole the Styx Stare into faces of the newly dead And blankly hope they find a bit of peace. But I wonder what they left behind there The children, grandchildren, friends, friends not met Or whole estates, homes, things not done, lost - gone, And then the slugs and leeches who suck lucre At someone's lonely forlorn death. I'm sick. I've ferried generations, and armies, But these are different, quagmired grief Those gods in glass abodes, they rail against Unfettered stupidity and such disregard.
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Jan Kronies, Unsplash
Palliate the grief Sardonis, this is for you, let’s talk, You make tasty drinks that deaden senses Even here in hell - what some call this place You need to make this tea with special skill A taste and swallow makes leaving easy. But please, despite the work, know your success Is that the passage should be easy - casting Toward the past, toward all the birds that hover Gulls, eagles, swallows, kites, and damn crows A firm, gentle token - what’s left behind. The birds don’t cross to the distant bankings But they fly near - soar above hard-edged crags. So, Sardonis, make the tea that dulls the quick, Palliate the grief… they pass this way just once.
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Traded In The Public Trust Those politicians who traded in the public trust Profiteers, carpetbaggers, and thugs Misfits to the misbegotten, soul profiteers. Look, our job here us to ferry, not to care But the lines are long, stretching for centuries. Another week of the coffin caravan Who can blame the gods for taking some revenge When men who govern govern for themselves But, some like Heracles and Persephone Have outwitted Hades, just if only for a while It's a great injustice this - and we should find A way to let some return, balance scales Who am I to circumnavigate the gods, But this corset of responsibility - far too misfitting.
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The Gods Remain Aloof
The gods remain aloof, like all the rich And they disdain their blessings and support For this hair-brained and half-assed scheme That poling the Styx for eons - back and forth Has led me to consider in these bleakest days. In the space where Acheron and Styx collide The current swirls, eddies subside, a vortex forms Between the shores, but toward the left, The rivers mix and swirl, unwary rafters fail But the skilled can surf the scope of time. And so, Phegylas, grab you flint and stone, Sardonis pack your teas and herbs, prepare Let's pay a visit to our zenith realm To seek, to find, - measure who’s at the helm.
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Grab Those Books
Edridgus, grab those books, rise, and walk with us You're no Prometheus - such a keen mind That tricked the gods, gave man fire, paid the price, But then again, you’re not Epimetheus, With a mind like stone lacking warmth or sense. The four of us, you who can read books, maps; Phegylas, who burns with pleasure to burn; And Sardonis, who knows the herbs of Lethe, Sweet delirium before the great decline of death; Shall hunker in the hull to make this journey. Rebels, musketeers we four - finding why The world has lost itself, mired in deceit Turned upside down, in life unfathomable, Reporting, without authority, seeking what's the truth.
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Skiff of death Look, I'll navigate this skiff of death To the vortex I described, as you each Balance the gunwales against the tide And we catch a celestial ride to the living world Bringing hell to earth - just to understand. And know we must at first seek out new garb To cover what we are - to dress as they do Masking identity - cloth to cover souls For I have learned one lesson all these yearsThat nothing is what seems - identity a pretense. Take heed and note, this is no simple task Finding how they have lost all sense and senses Loosing truth in their bad leaders lies The gods approved us, and so we journey on.
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Pandemic of Profiteering Phegylas, put aside your flints, no fires here Or yet, though I can see your thought and reason Burning down this place won't restore your son Wall Street, where we stand in new flashy garb, Is but the result of depravity but not the cause. This pandemic of profiteering is but a sign Of some greater sickness or malaise To build such monuments to wealth but Leave the poor to fend unfettered and alone Will fire the gods - great dismay, great anger. We welcome the dead in a different land But here no welcome comes even for the quick Life’s burden seems so great, I recoil - groan Rapacious greed a mortar of these stones.
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Age Does Not Erase Good Memories
Ah, age does not erase good memories And I remember dancing - all the tribe The whole town at Choes - no school that day But I was best at Askoliasmos, balancing‌ A skill that has served me well on skiffs. But why, dear Edridgan, do they think That a dosado with Thanatos ever ends well There’s no gaucho or salsa they can do But only a fandango - danse macabre Bedside flails as Atropos cuts the twine. Edridgan, tell me now, don’t delay, I beg What hubris drives them not to see some truth? Even Jove, aghast at their recklessness We danced to celebrate - they to defy the gods.
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Please Explain
Edridgan, you’re the smart one, please explain Why some live in such wealth and glory, apart From those who live in such wicked wicked Filth, grabbing as they must, for sustenance. We ancients could not live that way - would not. You can read. With all these books, Alexandria Pales - no match for what they have in store Vast treasures, inherited wisdom here Infinities of infinite debate, endless. More wealth and knowledge than Apollo kens. But Edridgan, now I ponder more How can these books be so neglected Wisdom left untouched, abandoned, The means but not the will to dream and thrive.
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If Any One Knows Oh Phlegylas, if any one knows better What its like to be stranded at death's door Then it's surely us, it's just our work site. Maybe that's why I commiserate so With these empty souls who face death but once. I learned long ago never to leave my pole And this Potomac looks like Acheron Gentle twists, sudden rapids, tricky water And there's nothing more disconcerting Than being up the river without a pole. No Phegylas. We were sent to reconnoiter This place, this time, these souls lost Before their lives are gone, empty wanderers, So deceived by such mindless soulless men.
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This Kant Guy
And I recall this Kant guy declaiming, Chanting on and on about categories And imperatives and shoulds and musts, And means and ends- what mattered and what did not Often obtuse, but clearly with a point. And here we are, listening to the means, The means by which the rich advance, The castes retain all the rank and lucre, Drachmas beyond reckoning, much more Than any man can spend before he visits me. Why Edrigan, with all your learning, Have you ever seen quite a thing like this? They've turned to Ploutos, damn sure, Selfish entitlement all the norm.
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I Remember Dante
Yes, yes, Edridgan, I remember Dante Arriving as he did with all those maps, Diagrams, circles, paths, and guides, Thinking that he would lead the way to hell, Forgetting that he too had to pay to cross. But yes, yes, I see your point, all sinners Had their place, according to their merits If you could call it that. Some here, some there But everyone in the circle where they belonged, Cause and effect in its purest sense - judgement. And Edridgan, I like your plan, observation, That some leaders who make lies the truth Convenient for a day, switching in a year, Antenora is the place for them, just rewards.
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I’ll Be Damned Well, I’ll be damned, but then again I am. It's so good to see how they've flattered Us by imitation, a compliment to our style. It smacks of the Acropolis, you think? Stately, proud, gleaming in the sun. But Sardonis, hear me out, grand settings Are caves without grand thoughts, profound words Reflecting those important thoughts on truth. Here instead, only selfish words prevail Self-interest predominates far too much. We were sent by Jove himself to witness this Error of the ways - an emptiness pervades These great halls - altruism gone, so sadly Nailed shut in the dark coffin of the state.
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By Jove and Jesus Too, Consider Phegylas, you lost your son, the gods It seems are without mercy when revenge Is the intent. But jealousy, green eyed, With saber teeth to tear the heart in parts Does no better, self-inflicted agonies. Money talks very loud as we learn their ways There's a chorus of conversations on What's truth or justice; as we note, they Are bought and sold at the marketplace Of public opinion, like squash or beans. They have every thing a body might desire And can travel to imagination’s end For all this, they've lost as well, like you; But you, you understand important stuff.
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Decorum Dictates Phegylas, I understand now, more than before The need to clean by fire, to burn out rot, It’s not about revenge but more about reduction To simplicity, essences, a burnt form of truth As in cinders argumentation whimpers. And Phegylas, yes, I remember as you say, All the traitors that came our way, dissemblers From the start - Cassius, Brutus, famous liars, But then again, Ephialtes, turncoat of the worst, And Quisling, yes, I remember him as well. But Pheglyas, this one needs a note, and more, Claiming wealth to some, poverty to others, and Dodging always Caesar’s due, making public theft The common crime. Take heart; we both know the end.
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Anagnorisis Please
Edridgran, you have read Aristotle And yes, I remember helping him across Though he almost seemed to know the way As he knew so much about so much, surely One who understood - impressive, mortal. No tragic hero without recognition Anagnorisis must be present there Else, then, what’s the point at all - a life So simply led but dumb beyond repair Death in ignorance without reflection. The gods know irony, relish its display Finding ways to deflate hubris, puff pride, Like empty wine skins left from Bacchanals Proud drunken revelers pay the dearest price.
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