Category Archives: Paul-Newell Reaves

BLACK HOOD

When I fear–the dark, or cold, gunshots in a shady quarter,
that demons of shadow follow me; when I feel–
like isolating, closing down, covering my head, turning inward;
when I am overwhelmed by the dangers I sought out–
need to lock myself away in a world all my own creation;
I throw up my black hood to execute my fears:

A world of light, of magic tricks, gyre and gimble, dolls that talk,
hopping trains, of running gin, speaking French or Arabic,
of watercolors, oil-clay, graphite, inks and fountain pens,
colonnades and pinnacles and quarried marble blocks;
complexity, infinity, problems without solution
–of movable type, of telephones–
where minds may wander, illuminations bloom; where
every doubt’s akin to sin, where intuition’s understood.
                  When you’re alone,
              when you feel doomed,
         throw up your own
    BLACK HOOD.