war fires

war fires still burn like frozen screams;

orgasmic crescendo into deaf years.

siren choir has fallen dead with manic laughter

where the water busts its blue head

over and over against jagged rocks

and marble smooth self deprecation.

 

but, the old battle hymn still haunts the cliffs:

teenage hoodlums drunk in the bar parking lot

plot the beer bottle assassination

of a folk hero antichrist with fists

like falling meteors and boots shined with blood.

should be quick and quiet if he leaves alone, they think.

 

he smiles a satanic psalm as the glass sinks

into a well-tended garden of thick callous and

memorial scars too proud to fade.

a punk rock overture charges every electron,

lightning slices through the flesh of pink summer clouds,

satellites crash to earth and buildings moan.

 

the white sands are stained maroon in the passionate

street-dance of violent confusion and hungry madness.

severed souls flop in the gravel like drowning fish.

once the last bone cracks and the final note fizzles,

territory changes hands and bodies are tossed in dumpsters.

nothing significant has changed.

 

it’s just that sirens have become obsolete

because all of the characters in the sequel

are chasing their own self destruction.

they don’t need demonic nannies

to call them to some shipwrecked death

or to lullaby their souls into hellish slumber.

 

they were born shipwrecked, nursed on death

and clothed in hand-me-down incautiousness.

some even grin as they dissolve into ghosts.

the beast howls laughter speckled with red

into his on-coming death train’s black iron face.

finally, he falls into the cold embrace of his true love.

Reviews

[Jūdan FyreHeart]

This I really like. The small mixes of mythology thrown in to the cynical view upon society and the changes we perceive. People don't need demons on their shoulders any more they quite merrily sell themselves down to the inferno. It's not as blunt and harsh as usual which adds to the feeling of creepiness, making it all the more real.

[Amy Bumpas]

Strange, but yet we are drawn, wondering what else
you will bring to life.

[Robin]

This read like a twilight zone version of the east side story - zip gun poetic

[V.B.]

This is the first poem of yours I have read that steps outside what I have come to think of as your more prose-centric style. And clearly you are capable of variety, because this is also excellent, excellent writing. I wasn't even out of the first stanza before I had noted three ideas I was angry for not having thought up myself in "deaf years," "siren choir," and "marble smooth self deprecation."

Damn you.

[M Baker]

This piece reminds me of Byron's "Darkness" in the way that it provides a rather bleak and systematic testimony for a world consumed by utter chaos. I find it interesting that you introduce a character at the end of the second stanza: some unknown third party that the speaker references. I'm not entirely sure what to make of it. I think that by doing so you force the reader to identify with a human presence in the brutal environs of the poem. That is something that we as readers would otherwise prefer not have done. We don't want any part of the hopeless hell of this great piece.

[Hayley]

This is amazing. You possess a true talent. Each stanza has its own string of emotion and image. I just don't even know what to say because I am speechless!

[Crowley]

Makes me feel like in some places and at certain times, violence rises from the soil like fog and hangs in the air waitng for someone to catch a whiff. Thats when the head bashing begins and the moon collects souls.....great write dude, I loved this.

[Kerry O'Connor]

I think this is pretty damn brilliant. I really admire (and envy) the way you can roll out these grand lines filled with original images, which sweep the reader's preconceived notions aside and force him to see the world through your eyes. Compelling, strange, frightening... Serial Kisser at his best.