Unknown
~for Chris Cornell
When the sun turns black,
you must be the light,
don't let the roses wilt on their stems,
let your body become a filament
that burns away dark thoughts.
There's someone on the other side
listening for your voice,
and when they don't hear it,
a weight grows
like a balloon filling with water.
I've seen my reflection in your words,
as I've seen it in a moonless pool,
as I've seen it in the shimmer of pistol steel.
I've seen myself relinquishing the hold
on so many clenched and crushed
blossoms picked from a field
in a murderous observation of beauty,
a beauty that should never be owned.
Sometimes it’s exhausting
just to draw breath,
but without it
the scents of spring
would never be known,
a world growing into itself,
as easy as an orbit
creates the illusion
of light that disappears
Chris Cornell -- teB360
Christopher Boyle and his siblings adopted their mother's maiden name after his parents divorced. As a teenager he played drums in the Shemps, which also featured bassist Hiro Yamamoto. When Yamamoto left, he was replaced by guitarist Kim Thayll. The 3 friends formed Soundgarden in 1984, with Cornell on drums and vocals until Scott Sundquist took over on drums, and Sundquist was replaced by Matt Cameron; when Yamamoto quit to complete his master's degree in chemistry he was replaced by Jason Everman and then by Ben Shepherd. In 1988 they became the 1st grunge group to sign with a major label. (Grunge is a fusion of punk rock, hardcore punk, hard rock, noise rock, and heavy metal). Their 4th album "Superunknown" (1994) was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Rock Album. However, the group disbanded for 12 years in 1997 while Cornell pursued a successful solo career. He was a member of the Center for Disease Control Boys in 1986-87, and he and Cameron formed a grunge supergroup, Temple of the Dog, which released one album in 1991; except for Cornell and Cameron, the band became Pearl Jam. Cornell also joined the remnants of Rage Against the Machine when it renamed itself Audioslave in 2002; Cornell wrote all of the band's lyrics before he left the group in 2007, and Rage Against the Machine reformed. However, Audioslave reformed as Prophets of Rage to protest the inauguration of Donald trump as president. Until his suicide in 2017 he continued working sporadically with his various musical groupings and as a solo artist.
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