876

Word

  • damascus / there was none



    modern day jesus never went near damascus
    in any case it was saul on that rented beast
    when the blazing regard of god caused such
    the insufferable silence. three long hard days   

    water from a wellspring poison from an apple
    every day is an eden shedding dreams upon
    the edifice the efficacy of vaccines the over
    tones of warlords in stolen toyota corrolas.

    take a picture and send it around the globe
    in your new optical fibres colours demons
    destroyers ordinary individuals going to
    church court funerals landscape resorts.

    dying to tell you how beautiful you all are in
    your cages in your beartraps eating through
    your tibias you bloody lipsticked goddesses
    showing off your tits your labias on 5G.

    dying to tell you how I nearly never made it
    I came across an ocean in a small boat with
    countless others I was looking for jerusalem
    but we found damascus instead, discarded.

    there are jewels that don’t reflect the light
    they eat out instead the innards of the sun
    and they make warheads laser weapons
    they patrol the shore wait for us at dawn.

    I came on the back of a flatbed riding out
    of mexico across the new border I delivered
    a message of hope and eternity in a swill
    bucket packed with skinned bloody rats.

    I stood at the beachhead where your fore
    fathers drowned I had my foot on the head
    of everyone of them whispering prayers
    watching their eyes for some

    recognition / there was none.

  • To pick yourself up

    To pick yourself up
    one bone at a time
    to make a skeleton

    to feed it muscle and revelation
    to watch it walk into the traffic with no clothes on

    to watch the sunrise
    to watch the birds sing
    with no eyes

    with your hair already in wisps
    the wind whistling through this cage
    where your heart lives.

    To pick yourself up
    one loose stone at a time
    to build a kiln where your heart lives

    to place your skeleton
    immortelle one more unopened rose upon these
    chalky steps of time

    watch it climb without sinew
    without reason fetch the cloudbase in your mind.

    to pick yourself up to turn your memories
    into gold to pour them molten down your
    throat like a longing

  • head of a snake




    To cut the head off a snake
    you need a steady hand
    and all the time in the world

    You approach it headon
    obviously

    and then, not with sticking knives
    or ugly with a spade

    but slowly, call it close
    in a loving embrace
    a lullaby or kind words
    draw a pretty blade
     
    sharpened on a lullaby
    sharpened on kind words
    until you find the bone

    and then you can relax
    watch the flickering gaze
    emptying into space

  • You Have Recurrent Depression



    w/o psychotic features
    like potplants
    that require watering

    every day, or they will wither and die.

    but not just any potplants
    and not those kind

    either, ones with wings and things
    and thorns

    and late at night
    horns.

    You have recurrent depression. This is not an admission
    of guilt

    This is just something that you go through
    like a tunnel
    let’s go through the tunnel

    let’s turn out the lights
    let’s look for the light at the end
    let’s keep going

    and if you need to turn around
    do so in the middle

    where you cannot see any light at all
    to either side

    and then water the potplants
    in the dark

    without any light 
    without any water

    without any hope.

    You have recurrent depression.
    Keep going

    there was a memory of the light
    that you held in your heart

    like a flame
    like a fire

    like a wildflower in a wildfire
    that you forgot to water

    that withered and died
    that reignited

    a pyrotechnic display
    a shadow in the middle of the tunnel

    in the dark
    you have kicked over the potplants

    by mistake
    and their dry soil has scattered across

    the macadam
    you are standing in the middle of your

    life and there are headlights
    coming

    from both directions and you can’t find
    the middle of the tunnel

    or your life or the centre
    lane

    and the noise is silence just before you   
    walk into the tunnel

    without any hope of reaching out
    or through

    You have recurrent depression.
    You have 1 New Voice Message.

    You have deleted all the potplants.
    You have stepped into the water.

    You are feeling well watered and
    incapable of withering.

    You are heading deeper
    into the tunnel

    it is upside down in your mind
    and there is hope

    that you will somehow find your bearing
    your posture

    your image in a mirror
    like this

    hanging askew along the edges
    tipped up and swimming

    towards the light of the
    sun. You have won.

    You are being showered with blessings.
    there are smiles in every photograph

    you will be seen in camera flashes
    the shiny glimmer behind policetape

    do not cross into the tunnel
    keep going

    along the mountain pass
    searching for water

    carrying these goddamned potplants
    all the way to the edge

    they will thank you in the end
    there was a drought

    and it was a kindness there was kindness
    in your heart once

    of all things

    you have recurrent depression  
    you are currently the first caller

    in the queue
    you are not watching your reflection

    in the rearview mirror
    you are driving

    there is a person in the middle of the tunnel
    and his hands are raised

    against the glare of your headlights
    and he is smiling.

    You have recurrent depression.
    You take your eyes off the road.

    The potplants on the passenger seat.
    The windshield glass in your hair

    under your collar on the leaves
    of the geraniums

    shiny like dew. You have
    completed this level.

    You are showered with blessings.
    You receive a message from the queen

    she misses you she loves you
    she pulls the trigger.

    You have one new afterlife
    and brand new potplants

    signed for and delivered and the weather report is sunny
    without any chance of rain.

    You will have to water them
    every day again

    or they will wither and die. 
    Or you will wither and die.

    You will wither and die;
    You have recurrent depression

    you are currently without water
    in the middle of the desert

    your potplants are your hands
    as you raise their thorns

    to your eyes     

  • dress rehearsal




    draw the curtains against the afternoon sun 
    and unloaded

    remove the magazine

    make space on the duvet and dry brush the chamber
    and the barrel brushing

    in a chamber to muzzle direction, removing large carbon
    and iron

    fouling from the bore. reach for the beer
    and tip the last tepid remains back

    replacing the empty bottle
    on the nightstand.

    place a cleaning patch dipped in bore
    solvent on the tip of your cleaning rod 

    push the cleaning patch through the barrel
    and out the other side

    get up grab a new beer
    from the small bar fridge you keep for emergencies

    saturate the chamber and the bore surface.
    avoid pulling it back. this will deposit

    gore. dirt and gunk. back into the
    bore

    allow the solvent to break down bore fouling
    for a few minutes

    while you knock back on the cold beer.

    check through a chink in the curtains that no-one has come home
    the neighbours are still out

    the only sound the sound
    of now. use the bore brush to scrub the inside of the barrel

    knocking back on the beer as often as you like
    in between brushing

    using a new dry patch to remove any residue
    keep it running through the bore until the patch

    comes back clean. stare at the white wall
    making patterns in your mind. conversations

    then. use a pull-through tool impregnated
    with negative connotations

    solvent, such as a bore-snake

    to further clean and treat the bore surface
    against corrosion. cleanliness is

    next. clean the exterior of the barrel. barrel lug. feed ramp.

    remember what it was like the first time
    how she

    you need to clean and lubricate more than just the barrel of the gun.
    you need to clean and lubricate the action

    you need another beer. you walk around the empty house
    with all the curtains drawn. music

    the action, slide. pump. bolt. use a nylon utility brush. dry cloth
    old t-shirt that she once

    dont you. spray the action liberally from the top of the frame/
    receiver

    allowing carbon and metal debris to drip into the drippan
    the shimmer of the heat of the taste of her skin

    use the manufacturer’s recommendations for your particular model
    allow the cleaned subassemblies to dry.

    use a towel. use a beer
    use the used pieces of your heart

    lastly. use a needle applicator to precisely apply
    lubricant drops

    at the specified lubrication points of her smile
    in the afternoon light the sound of cars passing

    the ocean washing up at your feet. the bodies of memories
    the mystery of the moon. the frame/action

    the slide assembly. the exterior of the barrel

    dont forget the magazines. the pictures the times she took
    more than you can

    drain the last of the sixpack leave the bottles where they
    lie

    special purpose brushes are available. use extra care
    during disassembly and reassembly as magazine followers

    are spring loaded.
    are summer fun. are autumn’s decaying
    of the angel

    reassemble the method
    and perform a functional

    check. leave the curtains closed
    the sleeping dogs

  • in hell. no hero



    never made it back send word
    release the paper tiger
    let it burn
    in hell. no hero
    in heaven. no hero
    on earth. no hero. tonight  
    no hero no lover no saviour no
    light

    let it burn
    a path that is lost
    let it curse
    in pulled tongues
    let it love through
    burst hearts

    let it bleed in hell. no hero
    in hell. no garden in hell. no hope
    in hell. no hero. no warrior. no saviour
    in hell
    no throne

    in hell. there is ringing.
    cages are swinging.
    the angels are singing
    in hell. to
    night

    never made it back send word
    to the light. let it weep
    let it bleed
    let it fight release
    the paper
    tiger 

    let it die

  • No Way Out


    No Way out. Exit through Oxford Circus.
    Round and Round/ in for a penny
    Exit through
    Leicester Square Paddington
    St Pancras – exit through the back of your head
    on a Thursday, of all places.

    Silent dogfight. Children of the Worm. The knives come out at night
    the knaves are faeries, the queen’s a bitch. Spread all across the world
    is her litter, gathered slowly back into the British Museum
    to steep, like tea. 

    For me to come to rest in such a time and space I would need to spin
    like a giant clustered engine holding all my insides tight
    everything I own very close
    and let it all out very fast
    in a violent exaggerated swing
    of the arms
    a dizzying christ in product-haze
    a platter of worth that hovers in server-cloud
    somewhat poised above the ground as film
    the negatives in after-burn.

    For me to come to rest, to find a way in – there is no way in. 

    Virtually everyone here is owned. Tinfoil on the steeple towers.
    The fingers of rowers blistered to bone.
    Immigrants and labourers
    the whole wide world, once plundered, now throned.
     
    Virtually everyone here is owned. Dethroned. On a daily basis
    you could travel without moving as the rest of the planet
    spins around you like a top.

    Like a 15th Century Priest carrying the Voice of the Sun
    in his breast. Like a destroyer
    sailing up the Thames
    the runes of a lesser city would have
    settled, as serbian killing fields, cambodian killing fields,
    ice upon mud upon ice upon bone,
    have done and be done

    in the ashes and hitler’s vice, but this is not the case
    nor the time nor the place. Face against the glass
    and a girl blowing kisses.

    Here come the Bastards to the Royal Albert Hall;
    first insertion into trappist monasteries.
    Beer garden dreams –

    aboveground googlemaps/ underground signalblackout,
    the wind before the train, the deadstare of strangers,

    smartphones, newspapers, kindles.
    A city built on flames,
    in tunnels.  

    No Way out. How many bankers does it take to plug an oil well?
    Not very many. About 5. If you insert them just so.

    The Queens Route is not the trade route, is not the spice route
    is not the slave trade, is not the hatching of globalisation
    following the french and american revolution.
    No, each morning she plants the same piece of ass
    on the same rattan chair and starts the oily cogs
    again, the parsimonious negotiations, acquiesces
    new world arbitrations while her sons and grandsons
    and vassals dither gathering coin and tossers.

    Penal detention codes come in many guises
    acts of salary destruction / what a world in which to live
    virtually, periodically. Piccadilly.
    Burger King. Watch the caged bird
    sing in silence, the lesser corruptions
    Exit through another manic station…
    capricious shoppers /

    It goes deeper than that.
    To the primal fear.
    To the core.

    It’s not as if you’re the last man on the midnight meat train
    It goes further than that.
    Much further.

    Your chances of escape have been reduced to:
    nought. Zero. 

    You could spend your entire life moving round in circles,
    hamsters on a string swinging in long forgotten
    childhood closets

    And you would never know, traveling as you do,
    all over the world and nowhere. Nothing.
    Nada.

    The primal fear.
    The core.

    No way out. Exit through the birth channel. Exit through the trees.
    Exit through the knees of your mother into the shadowy eclipse
    glimpsed once before and reduced to nought. Zip. Zilch.
    Filth.

    It’s in the wind that suddenly hammers down the chute
    carrying memories and dust from above the ground
    the wind that is slowly inexorably reeled
    back beneath the wheels.
    Whether you get in, get out,
    there’s no way out.

    There is the endless reeling forever
    chasing the darkness
    and chasing the cause
    the prime number – the door.

    Exit through the rear of the building;
    exit clean through the middle.
     
    And the search continues – the search for worth
    for first
    for last chances that have been
    inevitably reduced, all to nought
    to nothing. To this.

    People filter you out. When there’s no way out.
    People stare right through you.
    Not to the otherside
    no such grander scheme exists.
    Instead they see the anterior wall that holds
    their dreams and wants and needs in check
    the darker recesses of our greater fears
    our primal cores sans batteries.

    A black plate from which all the real and possible
    feasts of the world
    have been insistently removed.

    And we see in the surface a mirror of the self, sans appetite
    sans direction
    comic sans the gaiety
    reason sans the voice. A circus of the self
    for the shopping spiral to enact paths
    no consumer consensus could readily reflect
    no marketing method encapsulate
    no budget or method contain.
    Self or otherwise. The otherworldly serf.

    No Way out.
    Exit through Oxford Circus.
    Round and Round/ in for a penny
    Exit through Leicester Square
    Paddington
    St Pancras.
    Exit through
    the back of your head
    on a Thursday,
    of all places.

  • Dead Malls of America

    Chapter One | Scene One | Take One
    Leave it.


    A trolley with three brave wheels
    and one mutant – the front one
    the heading dog, beaten and retarded,
    spinning in its rusty arc

    A giant slice of macadam
    where the earth has once
    again pushed through,
    the evils of the dark regained a foothold on this plane.

    And a happy centre of the dead
     mustard yellow faded red
    Lowering skies and the cries of carrion birds
    whose bones have been picked
    clean

    and eagles, balded and spotted
    those giants of industry
    those outstretched arms
    Hollywood reduced to soot.  

    Upon your Lawn Chair
    Before your empirical Game of Golf
    Combover your hair
    Brink your Ship, Smile for the Flash
    Flood warnings

    alabama through texas
    texas through alabama
    sanantonio houston pensacola

    the skull of the gulf bottom jaw
    kicked out
    wave upon wave upon wave.


    Chapter Two | Act Soon | Time To
    Lose Out.


    Afterwards, at the dixie dimestore
    cup
    two teams troll for supporters
    No-one bothers to get up.

    Around and around your giant ferriswheel
    with the lights burnt out
    and your candyfloss machines
    returned to sender

    I would ask you to dance, your hand held
    out
    your once proud flame reaching high

    and wavering
    beneath the fluttering flag of the moon

    Your mezzanine level quite deserted.