Legion

My skin is cast in plaster

And the mold is long since broken.

Limestone induction.

Birth by force of will.

The spirit of the long dead,

Set up to dry on the windowsill.

Your costumer, she found me

In a charnel house,

The bones like yellow bells,

That clicker-clacked against each other,

Form in search of shell,

A heart as well, 

She dug 

From underneath the soil

That still clings beneath her nails -

Heart of someone,

She would not say who,

A cast off costume from

Some long forgotten show.

She formed this plaster flesh,

And carved the sigil in

My forehead's plaster skin, 

And whispered in my ear

The only honest word:

The secret name of God.

She swept the floors all still and clean.

She did her best.

This monster-mass of living flesh 

Among a forest of 

Automatons.

For I am Legion,

Cast into the swine,

The swine then trained to stand

Upon hind legs

And speak the tongue of man.

Lord do not keep me here

On cloven, trembling feet.

Oh gods! Release me!

Let me run the grassy grade

To drown my self

At last in the salt-sick sea!

(Image by Javier Flores)

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Showers

I stand beneath the angry steam,
Unhinged from all my armors.
As empty as a scoured kettle.
As solemn as a clapperless bell.

My hands, my rough, hairy-knuckled hands:
How could I have expected more?
You darling monsters,
You have done all that you could.
My face, a pimple stuck with crusted ooze,
Oh, face,
You were the best that you could manage.

Imperfection is a spectrum,
I have learned.

All things possess their faults,
They say - this is not quite true.
Some of us, weak specimens,
Are rather by our faults possessed.
The ghost of error tickling up our spine
Directing us,
Benevolently sure that it knows best.

The water runs,
Spittle from old pipes of verdigris.
The water runs and licks the dust and tatters,
Leaves behind, insoluble,
The sticky grease of sin.

(Image by Jerry Bowley)

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For the Young Blades

Heavy-lidded, aren't we, 

My Friday morning damsels?

The young blades canter past

The dark window of a once-apothecary,

Eerie shadows of a hazy red bulb 

Cast upon the Asphodels of skin.

My arms are a pornography,

Oh so ever pure, and slender smooth,

My face rests on a strumpet's neck,

That begs for fingers, implements:

There is nothing so delectable

As virgin flesh. 

Yes darling one, put on a subtle pout,

Yes little bitch, half-close those bedroom eyes.

Whicker those palms like a horses chuckle:

The way my skin shivers -

Taut and plump with my hydration.

Languor running,

Manicured,

A single finger up and down

The muscle that embraces

My vulnerable throat.

The young blades canter past

The dark window, of a once-apothecary,

Eerie shadows of a hazy red bulb 

Cast upon the Asphodels of skin.

(Image by Anderson's All-Purpose)

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