I WALKED WITH BYRON

I Walked With Byron

I walked with Byron in the regal sun
To the chime of his lordly laughter.
We spoke of our time on earth as the sea
Kissed our ruddy faces with delicious brine.
Then soon after
He softly said to me:
"Let us drink our fill of mystic wine!"
So we went to the garden, ornate with vine
And beside a charming trellis of white
We dipped our carafes into the glistening well
And our minds became enlightened with light.
He was in a poetic mood, and I could tell
That he wish to recite
Some verse from his books.
We reclined among the silver brooks,
And o, with what rhapsodies his lines did sail!
She walks in beauty was fine, but alas!
He spoke with the voice of Christ as a breeze did pass,
And his rhyme was like the rapture
Of the bright, midday moon's marvelous, misty veil
Which enclosed us there and did softly capture
My heart and my soul as I heard his song.
His words dripped like honey
And my heart did long
For the beauty
Of the maiden which graced his every line
Which was carried on scented zephyrs of blue.
For he praised my love, and her soft, sable eyes.
He praised her parted mane, and its raven hue.
And as we sipped our wine
His verse ascended to the celestial skies
With the broad, bright wings of angelic flight.
Then came the eglantine,
The spell of the radiant rose,
And the fresh mignonettes of the nascent night.
And after he was done,
His violet book did softly close
As the setting, saffron, splendid sun
Left me in awe of his rhyme and his prose.
He anointed my brow with still more wine,
And we walked amidst the flowing, slender streams
Each living for the other.
And we lost ourselves in splendid dreams
As friend and brother,
Amid the dappled, succulent shade
Beneath the brilliant, English ivory
Of an English colonnade.
And in that majestic umbrage
Of purple boundless beauty
Of beatitude and silent light
We felt the youth of our eternal age
Blend softly with the canticles
Of the beauteous, blossoming, silvery night.
And we rejoiced over our former manacles
Which once possessed our heart and mind
With darknesses and torments of a lasting kind.
For every tear that was shed upon that weary orb of blue
Has become a wreath of laurel!
(And the same, dear reader, shall be for you!)
Then we gave thanks beneath the emerald, sorrel
Trees of willow, dappled orange and yew.
And before he left me, he whispered in my ear
With the inflection of a sigh
Which the night alone did hear:
"When poverty had you, it was I, my friend, yes I
Who came in disguise and bought you that beer."

- Excerpt From Eternal Verse By John Lars Zwerenz

Visionary Wanderings   (c) Copyright 2013

MY FAIR LOVE

My Fair Love

I refused to pursue some Helen Of Troy
Nor to take the hand of some convenient Beatrice,
Neither did I yearn at some foolish balcony
Waiting on the likes of Juliet- No.
For my true love waited beneath the moonlit cornice
In a bower below
The colonnades which surrounded her there
Where she sat upon a wooden chair,
Her black, parted mane
Gleaming in the sunlit rain.
All the garden knew in its mind
Was to cradle her feet
Among the flowers of red and white
Where the somnolent azures meet
In the streams which glide by her kind
Reveries which glimmered in the tender morning light.
For I found my fair love
In a cloister by the sea,
Where the skies sighed above
A rapturous, radiant melody.
For I listened to my romantic dreams,
And o, my muse, I was faithful to you!
Now the tender forest beams
Its glorious strains of sapphire and blue
Upon us as we walk
Beneath the shade of the wavering yew.

From the Back Cover Of Eternal Verse

(BACK COVER FOR ETERNAL VERSE)

With Eternal Verse the poet uses words in carefully crafted poems to express and explore what it is to enter and exist in heaven.  In vivid language he engages the reader in descriptions of what was always considered by most western theologians to be ineffable.
Zwerenz's Eternal Verse has in its depiction of paradise a unique and personal point of view, yet he remains faithful to the Catholic Church's teachings in its Magisterium. In this astounding volume of verse the poet himself travels through the fantastic realm of our eternal end.  Not since Dante's Paradisio has this topic been addressed so triumphantly in the annals of western literature.

About the author:  John Lars Zwerenz (1969- ) is an American poet and writer known for his romantic, impressionistic and mystical works.  He owns a Bachelor's Degree in English From Queens College at The City University Of New York, but at the age of 24 he left his graduate studies in order to travel and write poetry.  This present volume, Eternal Verse, is his sixth collection of poetry.  He is also the author of Selected Poems, a poetic memoir on travel and adventure, Mist and Flame, a book of lyrical, romantic poetry, Visionary Wanderings, a volume compared to the labor and results of Rembrandt which takes the reader on a voyage of still further romantic and mystical adventures, Sonnets of Dusk and Dawn, a collection of sonnets, many in the form of odes, which laud the poet's romantic precursors, and Songs of Rapture and Other Poems, an exclusively mystical work which explores the realms of existential darkness and salvific light.

PARADISE

Paradise

We wandered in the sand by the sloping, frothy ocean
Pondering naught but freedom and devotion
In the afternoon sun which resembled ancient Greece,
Only exalted beyond all comparison.
Apollo has been amassed by The Holy Church
And among the glistening, ivory colonnade
The scented winds release
A serenading perfume upon the willows and the birch
Where the dappled shadows fade
Possessing ambers, blues and jade.
We walked still further to behold Doric columns which stood
Among squares of alabaster, statues and the boundless wood,
And we kissed amid the daisies fragrant with the spring.
We heard the triumphant voices of angels sing
As you capriciously took my masculine hand,
And led me to the fields which play beneath the cloudless sky.
A breeze scattered gold upon the lakes of the land,
As we kissed once more, and fell into a sigh.
Then the night ascended with its marigold reeds,
And we wandered further into the moonlight,
Barefoot upon the dew of the meads.
There radiant winds carried your perfume,
As we walked among the colonnades of white
In harmony with every bloom
We beheld the spirit of Iris
And tasted her rainbows beneath the boughs of a cypress.
More glorious than the myths of Zeus,
Christ appeared as a soothing boon.
In that splendid, astonishing, solitary moon
He blessed our love, and leaving your tresses loose
A summery zephyr parted your mane.
We walked nude on the beach in the silver rain
Beside the massive, swelling blue brine.
We sipped each delicious, intoxicating wine
Which flowed mellifluously from the streams
Through the glistening, starry amber sands.
Then tall, ornate Corinthian towers,
Situated among the spacious bowers,
Redolently crafted by God's wonderful hands
And gilded with azure wreaths of art
Led our mind to dreams
Of a troubadour's song.
How we loved in those gardens with all our heart!
Then we fell into a symphony, languorous and long,
Of ecstatic beatitude, of a pearl-bedecked beauty
Which illuminated every orb fantastically
Until diamonds rose from the rapturous ocean
To the scarlet skies where the blossoming dawn
Fed us every scarlet potion
As we lay upon the emerald lawn
In the great, green garden, in that wondrous dawn
Which arrived yellowish and gold and ivory-white
With the sun behind it- to the sun's delight.
And your lips became delicious to behold
As they inhaled the stars and the sunlight's gold
Our passion rose like a furious fire
In that good, majestic, mighty and bold
Sun of the morning's bright desire.
And your sunlit, sable, liquid eyes
Gazed up at the blue, paradisial skies
Overwhelmed with gratitude, ecstasy and bliss
As a redolent breeze swayed the singing cypress.
We beheld The Blessed Trinity and fell into The Father's kiss.
And our spirits ascended above the wide palms
Of the wavering, emerald tree
To the golden realm of the psalms,
To the wedding feast above the sea.
And we passed through veils,
Brighter than all suns, in a radiant, blue glory
Where The virgin hails
Her Son with regal praises of an alabaster sanctity.
And at the height of heaven The Father took our hands
As His Son bound us in eternal bands
And His Spirit roved around us gleefully,
Pouring me into you
And you into me.
We behold our mansion beyond the glistening yew.
O, my lover, come with me!
Let us drink from the carafe this Kingdom's wine
In the ballroom, in the study,
In the courtyard strewn with the rose
And the glittering vine.
And when your eyes shall close,
In that tower which overlooks the shore,
In the sacred night
I shall kiss you evermore
There where you lie
In our chamber where the light
Shall nevermore die.
Come, my love, my lover, my friend,
Our happiness is our perpetual end,
The infinite our delight!  


-Excerpt From Eternal Verse By John Lars Zwerenz
(c) Copyright 2013

John Lars Zwerenz (1969- ) is an American poet and writer. He is known for his romantic, impressionistic and mystical works. He has published five books of poetry: Selected Poems, Mist And Flame, Visionary Wanderings, Sonnets of Dusk and Dawn and Songs Of Rapture And Other Poems. His fifth book, a novelette, is a controversial and steamy love story entitled "An American Romance". According to Zwerenz, the book is a "purgatorial" work of fiction. It has been published by Penguin this autumn of 2012. The volume includes an appendix and an epilogue, both of which comprise his fifth collection of verse. A new book of Zwerenz's poetry will be focused on the subject of "paradise". It is called "Eternal Verse" and will be published by a major house early in 2013. Zwerenz is a mystical romantic. His writings are deeply spiritual in subject matter and tone. Much of his verse employs transcendental language and is rich in meaning and musicality. He often makes use of classical rhyme and meter in both his poetry and prose. One literary critic compared his poetry to "the labor and results of Rembrandt". Zwerenz owns a B.A. in English from The City University Of New York At Queens College and has traveled extensively throughout The United States and Europe as a kind of "literary wanderer". He holds a rather "bohemian" reputation since his youth. He currently resides in New York City, and is 44 years of age.

R.Canter

MARY

Her majesty emits a soft perfume
Which makes the poet weak.
Her feminine powers command his will,
And they make him humble- meek.
Her beauty is one with the blooms on the hill.
And when her petals unclose
Like a starlit rose
She captures him with a charming ease
As he surrenders to her gleaming might which flows
In the tranquil, scented breeze.
She shall be adorned with many costly jewels
And with diamond rings around her fingers
And with many precious pearls around her neck
For her immaculate perfume which sweetly lingers.
- John Lars Zwerenz

THE CLOISTER

The Cloister

The wide, gold portal lead to the diamond sun.
I witnessed rosy petals open, one by one
In the umbrage of a cloister, free from all lament.
Like breezes stirring in a vase, emitting every lovely scent,
The wells of the enclosure, so very redolent
Left me dazed in wonder as I met my lady fair
With cherry blossoms dancing in the tresses of her hair.
We strolled as a god and goddess through the garden alive with vines
And we drank from the matin dew
A manifold array of mystical wines.
We fell asleep in rapture beneath a willowy yew.
As we reclined amid the eglantines
Beside the silver sea
Your thoughts were of me,
My thoughts were of you.
How I wonder where went the spring.
In summer's saffron echoing
We heard carillons play from harpsichords of white.
Then Venus ascended with an angel's wing
And she brought with her the night.

- From Eternal Verse By John Lars Zwerenz

BY THE LAKE / THE GILDED BALL

By The Lake

Modest in your evening dress,
You sit among the grass of gold
Amid the wavering watercress,
Lost in sumptuous raptures of old.
And in your sunlit reveries
While a symphony sighs on the balconies,
The mountains in the distant, saffron light
Gleam beyond the courtyard's statues of white
Where the first diamond orbs of night
Approach in veils of purples bright.
How I long to touch you in those reeds by the lake,
And inhale the many perfumes that your sable tresses make
Which carried on the wind leads me to dream
Of a silent wood, and a flowing stream.

The Gilded Ball

Dante and Beatrice, Shelley and his lovely Mary,
Robert and Elizabeth, William and his Juliet,
Robert and his dignified Clara once met
In the mist of love, in cupidity's airy
Romantic ball.
They live on, they live on, everyone and all!
Welcome to the palatial hall.
The vassals will take your furs and coats,
And usher you into the drawing room
After your excursion by the lake on the soft, sunlit, wavering oats
Glistening in the light of the alabaster moon.
Each bride has her groom,
Each man has his mate.
Rejoice, for earthly gloom
Is forever beyond our fate!
The trumpets soon
Shall trumpet.  All silence shall abate.
Leave your worldly life behind you in the hall.
Welcome one and all, to the dance, to the ball.
The marble floors await your paces.
All of us saints are gleaming with enraptured faces.
And all the places we have seen
Though beautiful beyond all expression
Are but the beginnings of eternal delights
Always new within our sacred possession.
The pleasures here are potent yet serene.
Let the astonished angels light the lights!
The ballroom awaits with views of the majestic heights
Seen through the grand bay windows.
I shall take your fair hand and undo your braided bows
In the corner where the candlelight glows,
Aside the piano, next to the books
Where Sappho traces her adoring looks
Over her new poetic volume
Which speaks of roses in radiant bloom.
Let the dresses swirl across the room!
The piano plays, the trumpets blare
Melodiously amid the fanfare,
And the silver stars within your eyes
Beckon me: "Take me dancing until the skies
Are lit with the lightening of a thousand sighs,
Are shaken with the thunder of harmonies,
Of ecstasies,
Of flowing, white wine descending from flasks
Pried open by the cherubim, by fluttering, adamantine wings."
(Such glorious tasks

Are special things.)
And the band serenaded the musicians and the other saints
Until the dawn rose upon the meadow
With glorious, wondrous, purple paints.
And every shadow
Sent a shudder through me
Of happiness without an end,
Of light without a pall.
O, take me, take me
To where the willow trees bend,
With a carafe in your hand
To the boundless fields over the dew-clad land
After the wonderful, gilded ball.
We shall lie as dreamers, yet wide awake
We shall give of ourselves, and still give more
And with gratitude take
The kisses which make
The things of folklore
Even here!
Let us wander by the belvedere,
And caress among the glistening fountains
Beneath the breeze-blown trees, green, slender and tall
As the revelers depart from the hall
In the dance of the dawn, in the cradle of the mountains.

-  John Lars Zwerenz (From Eternal Verse) (c) Copyright 2013

John Lars Zwerenz (1969- ) is an American poet and writer. He is known for his romantic, impressionistic and mystical works. He has published five books of poetry: Selected Poems, Mist And Flame, Visionary Wanderings, Sonnets of Dusk and Dawn and Songs Of Rapture And Other Poems. His fifth book, a novelette, is a controversial and steamy love story entitled "An American Romance". According to Zwerenz, the book is a "purgatorial" work of fiction. It has been published by Penguin this autumn of 2012. The volume includes an appendix and an epilogue, both of which comprise his fifth collection of verse. A new book of Zwerenz's poetry will be focused on the subject of "paradise". It is called "Eternal Verse" and will be published by a major house early in 2013. Zwerenz is a mystical romantic. His writings are deeply spiritual in subject matter and tone. Much of his verse employs transcendental language and is rich in meaning and musicality. He often makes use of classical rhyme and meter in both his poetry and prose. One literary critic compared his poetry to "the labor and results of Rembrandt". Yet in his writings, especially in his verse, Zwerenz seems to dismiss the current age as something ostensibly irrelevant, and he likes to surround and place his subjects within a vaguely medieval setting. Some critics have suggested that his anachronistic qualities detract from the potency of his verse. Zwerenz owns a B.A. in English from The City University Of New York At Queens College and has traveled extensively throughout The United States and Europe as a kind of "literary wanderer". He holds a rather "bohemian" reputation since his youth. He currently resides in New York City, and is 44 years of age.
R.Canter

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