6. Chicken

Ethereal mist descends over clouds

 Of vision; no longer is memory

A life-line in times of ill autonomy

Only in duxal power is it found

The spider-web: what was, and could have been

Has been cut and carved to pieces, like the

Breast on a bone at a family feast

Before it’s tossed aside for dogs to eat

And yet, this severance has had no fatal flaw

That limb was torn from tendon was, necessity;

There is distance now, between hands and mouths agape

But it’s minutiae in the workings of serenity

5. Procrasination

Sitting inside a wooden box disposed,

To the elements of wind and sea and earth

With a cigarette and Shakespeare to hand

Tapping ashes into an empty lager can

Smoke entrailing to the spot on the ceiling

Where wisped heat could set alarm bells ringing

Surrounded by the debris of a student life

Surrounded by the reminders of night:

A broken lighter from a lover, her shirt

A vial of amber and a bottle of vodka

This is where the used things go,

So sweetly domesticated, then thrown;

Compacted once weekly and collected, alone

This is where the used things go

Twist

A Pandora’s Box;

An enigma; a puzzle

Wrapped around a lock

2. Triumph

Triumph waiting in the snow

Mouth afire and eyes aglow

This is where the caution goes –

To the wind

Scattered, shattered and torn

An age-old flame reborn

She was never really dead, just sleeping

With the corners of her mouth upturned

To the Piper

Windingly echoed down halls and streets

Of choke’d lead and plaster streams

This is happiness

6. Blisters

Unhealthy bones and contorted mind

Pale white faces gathered round the fire

They’re shivering and blistering on opposite sides

Idolised golden shimmers in their eyes

Such a fallen descendent of human-kind

Left to winter and fester in apocalypse ire

Peace was the piper and they held the key

To break the beasts of burden, from poverty

Unconscious greed led the mind of the hive,

Simple stupidity has made the huntress blind,

At the end of things,

Man will fall so quietly into the night.

5. Puddles

Move, skip, jump

A child’s foot in the lily-puddle’s eye

Ripples graced by humankind reflected in the sky

As graceful as a dancing bear,

As light-hearted as a woodland nymph

Echoing in the cavernous coils of the common mind

Rolling on into the emptiness,

Where the patterns begin again