Formaldehyde

fixed me with formaldehyde

embalmed me

incremental death by poison

slow

skewered brain, removed my heart

entrapped me

in jars and boxes, buried me

down low

fixed me with formaldehyde

till sterile

an empty vessel dressed

in finest wood

placed canopics

where I couldn’t find them

and bled me dry to live

in zombiehood

unearthed

void of form and feeling

peeling

losing bits along the way

morselled as a minion to the mighty

undertakers raped my soul each day

dismembered me and muted

with their needles

threaded lips till tongue-tied

did their best

weighed me

watched me

found me

waxen, wanting

dismissed me then

and put my corpse to rest

but

I rose again

and gathered all the boxes

found the jars

replaced my bits inside

unstitched my lips

and shouted

from the heavens

not fucking dead yet

mouth is open wide

formaldehyde yourself

embalm your essence

fix your flag to fortune if you must

I’ll tear your towers down

like lego pieces

rebuild it with a world

that’s fixed by just

fragments of the pieces of the portions

of the bits you tore away

and tried to hide

I’m watching you, you foxes

while you scavenge

my corpse is here to be

your nightmare bride

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PVC’d

Take one piece of plastic, just one fragment,

Stretch it so it’s longer, wider, thin,

Saran-wrap the life that you are leading,

Protected from invaders, nought let in.

Cling it onto self and tightly bind you,

Around, around, around, with overlaps,

Nothing from the outside will now taint you,

Filmed against all troubles and mishaps.

No seepage, spillage, no contamination,

Insulated from all life, preserved so much,

Now ask yourself if breathing is an option,

Covered head to toe, devoid of touch.

Feel it where it films in all its winding,

Around, around, around, to laminate,

Unhearing ears, unseeing eyes, unbreathing,

Distorting face and features, plastic fate.

Gasps ungasped, inhale, inhale, it’s useless,

Pants unpanted, panic rising fast,

Underwater world of drowning mastic,

Soldered, sealed by self, in moulded cast.

Uncommon bonds, hermetic, manufactured,

Around, around, around, to isolate,

Boxed up when all breathing has abated,

Bubble-wrapped in melted pellets, lie and wait.

Pallets ready, stacked outside the warehouse,

Conveyor-belted parcels, undiseased,

Thrown aboard for final distribution,

PVC’d, protected, but deceased.

Wide Shut For Sixth

Out of that darkness, that pitch of oppression,

Out of that blackness, that void,

Out of that dank trap of timeless cessation,

Fluttered wings fully deployed.

Flapped they with fury till furies they fled,

Eons of hostile subverted,

Out of the dungeon where demons have bled,

Their intentions subtly diverted.

Out of the abyss the albatross flew,

Chains still swinging from claws,

Stronger the wings that have practised harnessed

Though aerial given to pause.

Out from down under, down deep but not out,

Out from Cerberus’ grasp,

Felt in the darkness, eyes rested shut,

Earthbound by blindfolded task.

Up through the channels, tunnels truncated,

Veering, uninjured as such,

Instinctively seeing, hearing the light

Guided by sensory touch.

There to the high plains, a leap with all faith,

Rattling links still attached,

Power encompassed in breadth of the stretch,

Night, by flight, fully matched.

Sometimes in darkness, especially in pitch,

Only blind sense will suffice,

Failing the five, depend on the other,

Wide shut for eye of sixth sight.

 

I had written the first eight lines of this yesterday just based on ‘out of’ then left it to brew. In comments with Paul I happened to mention that I close my eyes to see better in the dark, which is true. I don’t really know why I do it but it feels more natural to sense my way through darkness than it does to try to see. The rest was born from Paul commenting, by return, that it sounded like a life credo. Maybe it is. 🙂

How Be It Dream

If, in inner eye

of languid 

somnolence

is felt

is seen

a million

multicoloured prisms

streaming on the beam

convergent

on pin-pointed purpose

to bestow

receive

paralysis

two-spirit gendered

ancient deity

suffusing and infusing

seeking soul surrender

in semi-conscious

state of sensuality

caressed and kissed

by ported rays

on zephyr’d fingertips

aroused from drenching

sun-blessed sleep

if

as felt

as seen

how be it dream

Where Angels Weep

Is it better to be absent when you lie upon a bed,

Presence close beside you, somewhere else inside your head,

Turning all the buttons in the channels of your brain,

Is it better to be all alone when absence causes pain.

Is it better to be silent when walking on the street,

Negating conversations with the lonely that you meet,

Turning face away from fears, frantic running fast,

Is it better to be silent when lonely people pass.

Is it better to be buoyant when spirit urges fall,

To try for more resilience when backed against life’s wall,

Pretending to the lonely heart that silent power wins,

Is it better to be buoyant while you flail to sink or swim.

Is it better to believe in dreams than curse the darkest clouds,

Surpassing all tempestuous with images around,

Fleeing to the hinterlands where dreamers send their prayers,

Is it better to believe in dreams than cry down oaths on never theres.

Is it better to be born a fool that never makes a plan,

Wisdom in the let it be’s instead of better than’s,

Painting pictures of their own while others purchase theirs,

Is it better to be born a fool and peddle varied wares.

Is it better to be born deaf, blind, all senses out of reach,

No touch, no taste, no scents, no sixth, distant from life, speech

Indifferent, heart of stone, oblivious to all,

Is it better to be born senseless than to feel the pain withal.

Is it better to suppress the self when angels beg their need

Though silent on a lonely cloud where usher’d tears fall, bleed,

Dripped upon the bed space where the absent hear, don’t fail,

Is it better to suppress the self when angels weep and wail.

 

Credits Rolling

Movie’s almost over,

Time to open eyes to life again,

Credits still rolling,

Giving time to make a choice and then

Sink back to sleep,

In coloured pictures – existence formatted – digitised on screen

Or live the dream,

The life you’ve seen and recreated time again in dreams.

Title music’s fading and the links are on,

Continuity, same voice

Designed to soothe and keep you prone,

Empty mug,

Discarded wrappers at your feet,

Soiled,

Comfort formed,

Patronised,

Token’d treats,

Then off to bed,

Arise,

Begin the same.

Controlled,

Encaptured,

Configured.

All for them.

 

Switch off, tune out………………….

 

Turn on. Tune into life, let’s dare again.

Com/pl/ex/it/y

c/a/t

chop, chop, chop, chop it into pieces,

put it back together like a jigsaw.

cl/a/p

chop, chop, chop, chop it into pieces,

put it back together like a jigsaw.

m/ea/n/ing/s

chop, chop, chop, chop it into pieces,

put it back together like a jigsaw.

poetry

chop, chop, chop, chop it into pieces,

put it back together like a jigsaw.

Life.

 

Lid Flickers

I close my eyes easily…

A drift of my lids to all dreams…

No slumber, mere silent communion, where

Nothing appears as it seems…

Where ease is no burden, no offering

To idleness, no easy aspire,

No guarantee of all happiness

But freedom to seek out desire…

No moments of misery for any,

For one, not even a few,

Not licence but liberty needed

To seek, to fulfil what is due…

From purpose for lonely existence,

Entrenching the cause of a soul,

Harnessed to physics and chemistry,

Released on completion of goal…

I close my eyes easily…

Awaken…

All of life but a dream,

Perception

One moment’s causation,

Light flickered…gone…never seen…

 

Tripping The Light

A place to pass, undivided,

came she calling,

tripped on moonbeams,

at her feet, carelessly,

closed eyes to evidence

of all obstruction,

felt her way,

edged darkness met oblique.

A passage in an underworld

known better

than light afforded

rights of pathways trod,

undeterred

in shadowed frozen starlight,

a slithered facial glimpse

of subtle god.

Resonance held bound

by briefest meeting,

a pocketful of light

to carry forth

into the dreams held back

in conscious waking,

a hesitation’s gift

of deepest worth.

Flight Lessons

I soared there

for a second

in time,

hovered briefly

in the millenia

of consciousness,

eagle-eye internal

to the words

found wanting,

glided on an updraft,

invisible to view,

felt in the breeze,

spiralled to gravity’s

reckless abandonment,

pulled up

short

before the crash

obliterating

reality’s

nonsense.

I  flew then

for a while,

lost to reason’s

purpose,

bathed in light

sharp against

my retina,

colours faded

to acute contrast,

rods only,

no cones.

A blink in time,

a truth eternal,

flight lessons

remembered,

regeneration of

cause.