Electric baby syrup

Here they come again through the strobe shadow rain,

hunched between Popeye houses,

the Russian closet poets wearing thin disguises,

playing with verbal vegetables,

the worst tillers of the voiced soil

since the days of Cain.

And the oilskinned ants arrived today

and it's rained all blasted week

and the lotus seeds are ruined again

and the vision master is acting crazy.

He wants to make another baby,

but everything has gone

three legged race hazy,

and the owl and pussycat

don't waste a second look,

just sail away to the crackle

of burning books.

Raindrops run on telephone wires,

little silvered messengers

of other peoples verbalisations,

the endless variety of never again

to be heard conversation

in this twisted land;

where concerned citizens

simply remain concerned.

And I hear the far distant screaming,

the barks and coughs, they

nearly blew me holy hat right off,

made me jump right out of me clogs,

leaving exclamation marks

arranged in circles

round me ever twinkling feet,

whilst scarecrows danced the tarantelle

and the crows closed in for a treat.

Strange things are occurring,

the cows eat pollution

and me old man's snoring

while his pacemaker goes on whirring

and then he ups and dies, 

just like that, on the spot,

with a top hat and a moustache,

just like a roadkill badger.

So we all left our bikes

propped in silence on bible walls

while the endangered honey bee...

buzzed

and the weeds and plants grew...

tall

like a fistful of violet mountains

improvident as the dawn

and once more and again...

we fall.

So one final time we hunt

for shots of penicillin

in the cobwebbed pharmacy,

just one more little bottle

of electric baby syrup,

old copybooks of accounts.

Einstein was right,

there are no decimal points here,

just staggered columns 

of handwritten figures

and several acres of old disused tin mines,

millions of toxic blooded heroes

and the meek whisper of time.

Now we are twined up

in wraiths of sea fog,

standing and staring pointlessly

as if resigned to fate,

like lonely dogs in a forgotten kennel;

and somewhere out there is a donkey

honking like a dry pump,

yearning for one more far, fierce hour,

when he will turn left instead of right

and finally have his day in the sun,

oh, how G K Chesterton was so right.

And then there is just silence

and it makes us jump,

and we all helpless

and plain foolish, here in this 

world of decimated opportunity.

Perhaps this would be a good time

to endeavour to love

one another all we possibly 

can until the day we die; 

or at least, we could promise

solemnly to at least try 

one last time.

Reviews

[Cassandra]

I really love the imagery of this poem! From the first line until the last, you had me hooked.