When streets are dead, when liquid lies have dried,
sifting shadows stitch a billion puppets’ eyes.
Mucus, in threads, is sewn into hide;
skin marries skin till the fresh puppets rise.
Out of my bed... man, out of my mind!
I slide into midnight from sleep’s tether torn,
the world to disdain, the hillsides to roam.
Sidewalks are idle, the storefronts all blind.
But there... and there... are life’s bleak reminders... there:
fleeing from footfalls, the whoring lowborn
scatter like rats under neon and chrome.
Then here... and... here: where lamps are no longer,
the black bushes rear. Creepers emerge, in moonlight surreal.
Shrubs break from soil. The foliage draws near,
longing to lean on my lean denim foil. Sampling, saving,
the branches converge: leaf learning flesh,
thorn tracing wheal. Tendrils, recoiling, in one motion merge.
So real they feel... In ghastly waves they ache my way,
reeking sweet patchouli, seaming scrub and sky.
They’re dreams, I swear; waking dreams are they,
rounding my limbs, reaching my heart,
they tremble, start, surrender and die.
High overhead, a lone rider wheels;
her mask, like mine, the pallor of bone.
No path, no pale... no surface have I,
none beyond the fog that chides
the chatter of my heels. The canopy reels
where I walk alone.
Slay me where the sunlight bleeds,
burn me where she dies.
Turn my bones in hallowed hearths,
where horror’s hand recedes.
Day is remade:
No one sees her flames run like beetles,
dashing rock to rock, crafting soot of hemoglobin.
Day is unmade:
No one hears her screams
take the elders in their dreams,
and none can know her timeworn scheme
of roaches, flies, and lullabies,
of pointless babies primed and plumped
on useless prayers and curdled cream.
Written as fools were we, from the moment our coding
was spat from the sea. Targets and tools, contused and confused,
bungling, begging, bumbling bastards all;
ridden like mules, abused till we fall.
Off in the dimness, the dark curtains part.
A rider appears, his steed mailed in stone.
No cross, no creed... no ballast have I,
none beyond the emptiness
that weighs upon my heart.
The deep shadows start
where I walk alone.
