The Somnabulists- a poem by Mark Palermo

A civilization rises and falls
A radio broadcast from 1953
is still traversing the galaxy
While somnabulists
wandering under starlit sky
have lost direction.
A blizzard of voices and fury
A flash of light
And now it all
is inside their heads.
The voice of the world has become their own,
Or so they think.
They are the lost souls
of forgotten Eden.
They are the somnambulists.

Another life is given
Another life is taken
Another rise and fall
And another 20 years pass.

Somewhere a bride stumbles at the altar
Her special day is ruined
with the stain of imperfection
But it was ordained
And she makes too much of these things
Somewhere an old man
Shuffles through a city park
smelling of piss and stale beer
Somewhere an executive places an important call
Somewhere a housewife has lost her keys
And the earth wheels round the sun
Like a drunken driver
on the last day of summer.

60,452 passed over today
Even the blowflies and cockroaches
are conscious on this day
That something has changed
The moment of commingling draws nearer
Consider the lilies of the fields
And the atoms of your body
Calling for union
From deepest cellular depths

Heed these words of warning:
Tonight you will dream
of a bend in a wide river.
Under cloudless sky
and in childhood’s fields
You will come across it briefly,
and feel its fleeting vision

The time is at hand
But have no fear,
you somnambulists of earth
He who loses his life
will regain it.