A Hundred Ways

A hundred ways
to remember the nameless,
stand between the seeker
and that one never to forget.

Ninety-nine abandoned attributes
linger in the faint attar of imbued nostalgia,
wrenched in the twist
of the implacable iron wood.

The variegated visage of the beloved
dissolves within distraction,
revealing the empty path of veracity
to maundering mendicants.

These, collecting the dust of true essence
on the trailing skirts of their khirqas.
Lives bead and flow down a pillar of paraffin
Rendered free by the heat of a flame
Dancing wild on the tip of a wick.

Lovers come undone;
Into river runs of melted awareness,
convening at the coast of consciousness.

Surrendering to the sea
Where seven continents of meaning marry.