Boa's Ark

     1. MORNING HAS BROKEN

The men, in lines, tramp two by two

(forgetting all the women who,

preparing for a night of tricks,

were painted with their flaming sticks)

and think about the time ahead

when they’ll be gone, their bodies dead

(some rotting slow’, some mummified)

though once they were their mummy’s pride.

Attired bright in uniforms,

they’ve strewn their bombs in desert storms -

like melting sands, the sky deforms

with darkness, death - and doomsday swarms

through ravished lands where fires warm

the corpses, cold and puriform.

Their eyes flash forward towards the back

of lucky ones who have the knack

of never being in the way

of bursts of bullets as they stray

(effacing phantoms faraway)

but live to die another day.

They’re wishing for a foggy morn

or best of all to be unborn,

and peering down to mark the sway

of wings in webs while spiders prey,

they wonder when their time will come

and they can cease their fleeing from

the sights they’ve seen, the deeds they’ve done,

the life they’ve lost, the death they’ve won,

then muse a while upon the child

they killed today when they went wild,

and when they’re finally reconciled

with broken bodies stacked and piled,

they ponder, does she have a kin

to curse them for their burning sin?

And if she does, will god reply

with tooth for tooth and eye for eye?

Or will her clan be mild and meek

and simply turn the other cheek?

     2. MIDDAY MUSINGS

They’re counting steps to pass the time

and puzzle if they’ll reach their prime

or if instead they’ll serve the worm

their carnal flesh and aching sperm

when soon, perhaps, they sleep in berth

provided by the chilling earth,

and fret about the fate they’ll find

below the stones that slowly grind.

And once or twice will come to mind

a sultry smile they left behind

(the distant past - a tepid trace �"

another time, another place),

reflected in a death grimace

that paints a frightened withered face.

And on they trek through guilt and gloom

to track their own and other’s doom

and soon they’ll  grace another pool

with blood of other beings who’ll

inhale no more the evening airs,

unlike the wily Functionaires

who brutalize the fighting men

and send them far away and then

(relaxed, unwound, with victories made)

confer with sword an accolade

on those who’ve lopped heads bowed, with blade,

so someone bent must turn a spade

to hack a hole which then is filled

with all the cloven bodies killed

then cloaked with clay or loamy dirt,

as if to hide the pain and hurt.

     3. TEATIME INTROSPECTION

Amongst the many are the few

who maim and kill and think it’s true

that purple war’s a parlour game

when really they are draped in shame

for crimes of which they are to blame

and can’t expunge with searing flame

while plodding through an endless time,

or pealing bells with holy chime,

or posing in a paradigm

where paradox and riddle rhyme.

And when they die, as die they must,

forevermore their putrid dust,

still soaked with gore and carmine lust,

will conjure thoughts of cold disgust,

and even though torrential rain

(which tastes at times like cool champagne)

can wash away the scarlet stain

which mars the earth and its terrain,

it cannot ever cleanse the hands

that work the guns and burning brands,

or purge the throats that give commands

to him who never understands,

nor can the raging hurricane

from blackened souls the white regain,

rescind the sins or void the banes

or shroud the night with golden chains.

     4.  EVENING REFLECTIONS

When through the night and day they pass,

their eyes avoid the looking glass

displaying dim a pale phantasm

plunging deeper in a chasm,

surging through a blood orgasm,

smiling thin unveiled sarcasm

for the chances lost to taste

the many fruits that went to waste

when each was still a joyous lad,

who went to school and learned to add

and danced in rivers barefoot clad,

and went to church with mom and dad

and learned about the good and bad,

before he grew insanely mad

and took his brothers by their throats

and thrust them into  midnight moats

and watched their booted bodies float

(quite like some broken battered boat)

and left the rag of bones to bloat

in bullet-ridden overcoat,

and wondered if the goblins gloat

or spot (behind his eyes, a mote),

then strode away without a thought

that mortal lives had come to naught,

sedated by his conscience brought

to nothing more than dripping snot,

while Others sit upon a yacht

and pluck the eyes of perch They’ve caught,

for fishes die and seem to see

The Ones behind the tyranny

(with bellies round from gluttony)

in future dangling from a tree

(with leaves as black as ebony),

for that’s, They fear, Their destiny.

     5. MIDNIGHT DREAMS

At night the soldiers sometimes dream

of many things which make them scream,

Like

                      floating down a gelid stream

             with burning flesh and cold ice cream

             upon their lips, which makes it seem

             as though their salt they can’t redeem

             when looking back in bold extreme

             at valiant warriors’ victory scheme.

Or ofter yet,

                      they sometimes meet

             a broken skull upon the street

             with gaping eyes and mouth replete

             with swollen tongue that cannot greet,

             or yell aloud or indiscreet’,

             or talk about the grand deceit

             of Those Who live on Easy Street,

             Who plot, destroy and overeat,

             while others wait beneath a sheet

             on bed of steely cold concrete,

             with final gift a flag or wreath

             that soon will wither like their teeth

             when once they’ve settled underneath

             (a mound of muck on vacant heath).

And ever more before they wake,

appear the dreams not quite opaque,

like

                      upside down upon a lake

             keeps popping up a pregnant Drake

             who says “there must be some mistake,

             I only have a belly ache”,

             while high above’s a flying Snake,

             she cries aloud “you are a fake,

             you’ve eaten up my birthday cake”;

             and turquoise Turtles on the make

             (they’re grinding gears to overtake,

             while slurping down a chocolate shake)

             arise to say “let us explain,

             we think you men are all insane,

             you should be made of cellophane

             and ought to wear a window pane

             to see more clearly those you’ve slain,

             enough to fill the Dim Domain

             with blood and guts and tears and pain,

             Chimeras of a frenzied brain.”

             A worn and weary weather vane

             announces floods of claret rain

             that forty days and nights sustain,

             submerging mountains, raising Cain,

             and flushing mankind’s acid reign

             down nature’s evolution drain.

             The Serpent hails a hydroplane

             “because”, she hissed, “we can’t remain;

             behind the hill, the atom’s spark

             has wiped away the palace park,

             and turned to dust the rainbow’s arc

             and blotted out the Meadowlark”.

             And while the others hush and hark,

             a feline Toad begins to bark

              “This plane is certainly Boa’s Ark.

             Let’s flee the Human hierarch,

             forsake all Men to sate the Shark

             that swim beneath the Waters Dark,

             and purge the traces of the Mark

             in Eden when we disembark.”

             The beasts, in lines, by twos embark ...

The dreamers wake, they’re staring, stark,

behind their eyes a watermark...

Reviews

[Valentine]

It is hard for me to see all of your rhyming , in each set. I am lucky to have 2 out of 4 rhyme. Just keep on writing. Valentine

[Terry O'Leary]

Than you, Valentine...
My name is the seed of my rhyme... ;-))