Grief Eater

This image is entitled "Grief Eater".

Grief Eaters

Pudgy little demons
suck on the corner
of her eyes
and feed on the tears
her soul refused
to let flow.

Soon,
they will gorge
themselves
and fall
back into hell.

They become
moist tidbits
for thirsty masters
that have long since
forgotten the
necessity of sorrow.

Ecstasy of Drowning

Ecstasy of Drowning

When we kiss,
our tongues melt
and drip
from the corners
of our mouths.

We are wet breath
on moist flesh
and rain on each
other until we become
a storm.

The world floods
and we float naked
before the universe
unaware of anything
but the ecstasy
of drowning in each
other’s arms.

God is a Mirror

God is a Mirror

When a puppet dangles by one string,
it is easy to confuse it with a noose.

When the puppeteer jerks
too hard,
we find ourselves
falling upward
toward God.

We hover briefly
before the Almighty
almost convinced
of His existence
until we notice
God is merely a mirror
and our own reflection
is staring back.

Gravity prevails
and we watch ourselves fade
as our point of origin
and destination
converge.

Viewed at a distance,
we are nothing more
than dark specks
trailing tattered strings
against blue sky
and white clouds
destined to become
bruised flesh
and crimson mist.

Tell me once again
of God... and this
time, try to conceal
the fact you're
lying.

Human Sea

This picture is entitled "Wave Runner".

Human Sea

"There are nearly 6.5 billion people on Earth; each one of our bodies carries roughly ten gallons of water. We are a living ocean."

Our essence is wet.

There is an ocean inside
our fragile frames;
it courses through us,
connects us,
and laps against our foundation.

We are merely shores
on which common waves break
--barely contained puddles
with leaky souls.

Navigation to foreign coasts
is a hazard seldom attempted
and rarely attained.

When we dream,
we wade into familiar waters
that have passed
through billions of souls
and float in unison
with strangers
temporarily disregarding
corporeality.

We swallow and are swallowed
thinking ancient thoughts
and forgetting ourselves
until we wade back to shore,
dry off,
and go back to the house
with two oval windows.

Kisses My Soul

Picture entitled "Alternate Sappho".

Kisses My Soul

I am currently falling through god. When I hit bottom, hopefully, there will be enough residue left over to rebuild something --maybe something useful this time.

My reflection
leaks from the mirror
as I slip in the
remnants of my soul.

She speaks to me
in a Sunday voice
(the past mixed with
passion and reverence)
and says,

"Let me stain
your tongue
and drip from
the corner of your smile;
swallow me
and make us one."

Drunk on ghosts;
I fall into bliss
only to wake
at sunset
and die with the sun.

Spitfire and Monkey

My cats Spitfire and Monkey.

Children of Bizarre Gods

Figure 1: "Children of Bizarre Gods".

Children of Bizarre Gods

Say: I am only a warner, and there is no god but Allah, the One, the Subduer (of all):
--Suad 38.65, The Koran

Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
--Exodus 20:3, The Bible (King James Version)

I. Shelter of the Lilith Kindred

She is easily deceived
by Jehovah's horny angels
who fled fluffy clouds
to crash her Bacchanalian
celebrations.

(Shadows born of
candles dance on
the angled wallpaper
of her studio apartment
as she finds lovers
in the wisps of
smoke curling around
her fingertips.)

The party crashing seraphim
whisper into her guilt filled
ears that satyrs are demons
and she'll go blind
if she keeps playing
with their horns.

But kisses come
more quickly than wisdom
as she pedals her
sagging spirit
through endless cycles
of lust and loneliness.

(Over-chewed fingernails
result in throbbing keystrokes,
crimson splattered mouse pads,
and broadband stigmata
as she immerses herself
in chamomile tea
and Jack Daniels.)

In the right light,
bloody Band-Aids
are makeshift altars
to newborn gods
hiding from
crosses and crescents
as worshippers
are forced
to chase binary
moons across
digitized fields
and the ancient ways
fade from her balcony
in slow motion
as Diana flees
at a rate of
38 millimeters
a year.

(Centuries later,
she fingers bruises
while counting ceiling tiles
barely reaching double
digits before
the other person
in her apartment
grunts, shudders, and slides
from her moist flesh
free-falling
through dirty laundry
into peeling linoleum
and out to younger skirts
with better credit ratings.)

The children of bizarre gods giggle,
take her by the hand,
spin her through the door,
and together
they fall from sanctuary.


II. World of Crosses and Crescents

Surely those who disbelieve from among the followers of the Book and the polytheists shall be in the fire of hell, abiding therein; they are the worst of men.
--The Clear Evidence 98.6, The Koran

Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.
--Exodus 22:18, The Bible (King James Version)

To know a person's religion we need not listen to his profession of faith but must find his brand of intolerance.
--Eric Hoffer (1902-1983)

Outside the Lilith Shelter,
the unblinking eyes
of the Solitary Gods
have risen in solar glory
reddening flesh
and blinding the throngs
of the tattered
as they reach for faith
and the baubles
that accompany it.

She stays to the shadows
for the Kaaba facers
and the Crucifiers both
lay claim to the light.

The voice of God and Allah
are now explosions
and shrapnel are scriptures
penetrating flesh
probing for soul.

Allah speaks,
and she hits the ground
as crosses spit from
biblical revolvers
and crescents slide
from oil soaked scabbards.
Metallic angels with
mechanized wings
lurch heavenward
as calls to prayer
mix with rotor blades
to craft the melodies of bedlam.

The priests and the muttawas
rove the bright streets
with switch-crosses
and steel rods
forcing the female divine
into supplication
or at least to her knees
for sexual gratification
before they stone her
as a slut.

Dodging stones
she passes
through the city gates
far from Gethsemane
far from Mecca
into the twilight passage
that leads
to the Witch Crossing.


III. The Witch Crossing

The gods of the old religion become the devils of the new.
--old saying (usually quoted by adherents to the old religion)

The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.
--Pat Robertson, The World Almanac and Book of Facts, 1993

She journeys until
she no longer hears the voices
of the one-Gods.

Until the only voice she hears
is that of her own soul
crying for the losses
of generations of children plowed into the
earth by religious war machines
fueled by the blood of the faithful
and directed by political holy men
that confuse battlefields with gardens
planting dead flesh
to harvest crops of pain, loss, and suffering
in order to feed the hordes of the bereaved.

She journeys until she
collapses in sorrow
and her tears flow
into the cupped hands
of the children of bizarre gods.

She whispers she's sorry
as sympathetic hands,
lead her to the river,
cast her tears to the moon,
and vanish into the night.

Confused, she dips her hands
into the water and drinks.
She sees
her reflection mix
with the moon's
and suddenly
the lunar painted ripples
rouse and tremble.
Ancient eddies swirl with energy,
as watery moonbeams
revel in their awakening.

They evolve into orphan waves
and leave the refuge of river
to slip through air.

They are glistening moon glimmers
circling her head,
kissing her lips,
and quenching her thirst
for spirit.

They diffuse into her flesh
filling her with primeval dreams
and visions of the divine.
They entwine with her soul,
tug at her core,
and pull tissue from spirit.

Panicked,
she tries to hold herself together
until she is caught
in the ecstasy of the moment
and lets go.


IV. The Evolution of a Goddess

Physicists and Mystics have looked at the Universe and observed the same things, but the Mystics spoke in poetry, images and parable, and the Scientists spoke in numbers, equations and formulas.
--Abby Willowroot

You may drive out nature with a pitchfork,
Yet she will ever hurry back
over your foolish contempt.
--Epistles 1:10:24, Horace (65-8 BCE)

Cause you're the only song I want to hear,
a melody softly soaring through my atmosphere.
--Soul Meets Body by Death Cab for Cutie

She falls with the rain
on to the backs of lovers,
drifts through trees
with summer winds
as the leaves tickle her soul,
and becomes the sand that sifts
through the fingers
of children of bizarre gods
as they play on the beaches of eternity.

Her naked soul
lay spent before the Cosmos
as she spreads
across the earth.

She forgets herself
and becomes a lullaby
on the breath of the Goddess
singing angry Gods to sleep
so that Her children
may once again walk in the sun.

Quick Note #1

This is just a quick note to let my friends know that I will be gone for a few weeks. (I know I have already been absent for a while. Please forgive me.) This especially goes out to Cargwaps, Blue Rogue, Mashiara, and Soulless... their words are medicine to my sick soul.

Disfigured Souls

Disfigured Souls

Disfigured souls
damaged in spiritual transit
are claimed by divine insurance
and shoved in a flesh box
to be sold as is.

Gods on a budget
buy us up without a warranty
(the expectation for failure
is overwhelming)
hoping to get their money's worth
before the inevitable breaking...

and when the 'pending shattered'
finally falter and burst,
we are scolded and beaten
before being cast down to earth
as human debris.

Here we live in a junkyard
of misfits and factory rejects
fumbling failures begging
a second chance from cheap gods
even as we revel in our own
inadequacies just to spite
our creator.

De-Generation

This picture is entitled De-Generation.

De-Generation

And the greatest minds of my generation
are masturbating to Lara Croft
--and she isn't even real. But
you got to have faith. At least
that's what the preacher says,
so, get the Vaseline and the KY Jelly.

"For the fool has said
in his (or her) heart there is no God."

So do I believe in God because of
prideful pricks of not wanting
to be a fool...

wait,

Croft is raiding another
Tomb. Puff on a smoke and pause...
look at those digitized inner thighs
hmmmmm, pixel perfection.

Toilet bowl wombs with water running
all night. The anti-depressants work,
at least they do at the prayer meetings
with Lord Calvert.

Conservative backlash...
"Damn Hippie! Long hair!"
Apologies were issued once they found out
it was actually Christ.

So why do we want to know?
Because of hell, that's why.

That's where the Coke machines
steal your money and there are scratches
on your CDs and McDonalds closes
at 5:00pm and they issue you a
cable bill twice a month.
Where obsolete serotonin seraphim sing
praises to Freud while lewdly
dancing around my brain stem
like nymphs around a maypole in
a fertility rite and to my dismay the only entry
in my little black book is a picture of my
right hand with a note that states
that my video game rental for
Tomb Raider is four years past due.

And after all this, what is real?
Cracked heels, irregularity, tampons, yeast infections,
and pre-paid phone cards to call
the 1-900 suicide hot line where
menu options offer blow jobs, church donations,
psychic readings, and psychiatric help.

And nobility is defined by the amount
of sexual harassment grievances, DUI
charges, and Microsoft stigmatas we wear.
(Pixels bleed from our fingertips
and are quickly gathered for DNA testing
to prove our lack of faith.)

Trippin' on espresso, we perceive reality
in frame by frame 3D rendering and wonder
why God hasn't upgraded our CPU.

And Heaven is further away than a max'd
out credit card and God is still safe from mortal's view
under the guise of trickle down economics and
earned income tax credits.

God sips margaritas with crucifix tropical drink toppers
and smiles until He inevitably
pierces His lip and all humor is lost --except for a slight
giggle echoing from Galapagos where
Darwin cleans the Vaseline from the Playstation,
and Freud licks his cigar.
But God's lip is still bleeding;
the droplets forming words plagued with conjecture
and multiple interpretations.

Between the lot, no one had a condom.

And is this how we got here?
Are we spinning in the porcelain
choking on cigar smoke and Vaseline residue
with Tomb Raider theme music playing in the
background?
Was Lara Croft the inspiration for our existence?
Did He have to hurry because the Pizza Man
was pounding on the door, already swearing
damnations because he tripped over a pair of roller blades
and slipped in the remains of the last beer run?

Generation Next falters from the game,
mumbles incoherently and says why am I
reading this? Lara's on the tube and there's
no one in the bathroom.

God's bleeding may have stopped, but
the stains remain. Scarlet Rorschach inkblots
in which we once guided our lives and in which we
gained our ideas of morality are now spectacles
for the Inquirer and Jerry Springer.


Author's Note: Inspiration from "Howl" by Allen Ginsberg.

Lip Service (Cracked Sun Gods)

This picture is entitled Cracked Sun Gods.

Lip Service

Kiss tripping
on cheek and neck
as lips warm
passion's path
and wisps
of smoky flesh
wrap around bare thighs.

(Breathing on embers
make them glow.)

My tongue
catches you on fire
and too soon
turns you to ash.
Consumed, you crumble
and are gone.

Embracing ash,
soot powders
my body
and I wear you
as a sacrament.

(God never tasted so good.)

You mix with
tears and sweat
becoming blackened streaks
leading to thirsty eyes
that will never
drink you again.

Chasing Halos

This image is entitled Neon Angel 13.

Chasing Halos

She spent most of her youth
chasing her halo
as it rolled away from God.

By the time she realized
it was gone,
she had two children
and the memory
of the man that fathered them.

She spent her days
sealing her fate
never quite cognizant
that her daughters
were chasing halos
of their own.

Wagers of the Dead

This picture is entitled "Demon Within".

Wagers of the Dead

She slips between the sheets
of the dead.

Hung with the draperies
of mansions in disrepair,
she carries the moon
on a silver curtain rod,
opening herself when the
sun trips over
the horizon and
falls into her lap.

Pale breasts and red lips
give the illusion of pink flesh
when she's shaken hard enough
and her face blurs
into the background
of carved mahogany
and old canvas.

Warm breath on a
cold night intoxicates
the demons in angry men
who wager her like
ancient currency
in games of chance;

and though divine writ
states souls cannot be bought,
they most surely may be won
and lost.

Feathers in the Fog

Feathers in the Fog

The old bat kept ordering
insecticide off the television.

She said, "Angels keep
nesting in my hair."

I said, "I don't know
if it works on angels."

(What I should have said
was that you should
leave the house
when using an insecticide fogger
--and, if for some reason you stay,
don't smoke.)

When they found her
she was on her back,
singed bunny slippers in the air,
surrounded by the carcasses
of a thousand dead angels.

Evolution of the Lifeless

Evolution of the Lifeless

"A predator is the culmination of its victims."

She is strips of meat
dangling between
the teeth of predators.

Her soul is
in their bloody breath
as they speak
the language of murder.

Unaware of herself,
she sleeps
in her killer's flesh
only to awake
to the scent of blood.
She is self-aware just long enough
to welcome future victims
to their new home
(a colony
of the non-violent
in the belly of the beast).

Alien in the Artwork

Alien in the Artwork

If God forgets you,
did you really exist?

The landscape painted
around my life
loses a dimension
and falls flat before me.

Perception is lost
and I fall prey
to the illusion of depth
as roads become walls
trapping me between frames.

Familiar strangers
speak in stop-action
disappearing when they turn
to talk amongst themselves
(abruptly re-appearing
when they turn again to face me).

Desperate for perspective,
I run to the edge of the canvas,
only to find my flesh
periodically rip in neat seams
as I get paper-cuts
from people in profile.

Surveying the scene,
I realize these shoal souls
with tinny voices
are not the foreigners in this land
and that I have become
the alien in the artwork
desperately seeking depth
in a shallow world.

Pretty Paper Hearts

Pretty Paper Hearts

She would wrap her heart
in pretty paper
and give it to people
she thought might like her.

But when they unwrapped
the pretty paper,
they would find nothing inside.

She later discovered
that her heart
was the paper
and the act of opening it
also ripped it to pieces.

Before too long,
she decided to keep
her paper heart to herself.
(But her tears made it soggy
and prone to ripping.)

When they found her,
she had drowned
in her apartment
clutching wet paper
filled with old news.

Jagged Dreams

Jagged Dreams

"and (they) said to the mountains and rocks, fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne..."
--Revelations 6:16

He steals dreamcatchers
to harvest their nightmares.

He wrings them
with desperate fingers
into buckets of paint and blood.

He dips his brush
and paints
pictures of himself
on cracked mirrors,
broken bottles,
and shards of glass
that he franticly hides
underneath rocks
and used newspapers.

Each brushstroke
spreads him thinner
and further scatters
his shattered soul
in an useless attempt
to flee from god.

At a safe distance,
she trails behind him
with a wicked smile,
a broom,
and some glue
(force-fixing
the intentionally broken).

Note: Dreamcatchers are Native American amulets used to capture nightmares while sleeping.

Friends of Words I Once Penned

pricked by the thorns
of black roses,
she bleeds heroin
in mother's milk
and I suck
in her apathy
until I turn my
back on the divine
and drape myself
in the flesh
of loose women,
cheap wine
and heresy.

many years later
friends of words
i once penned,
find me
incoherent
and babbling of the
gods i have forsaken
and write an
epic of loss
(each word falling
like loose change
into the cup
of vagrant angels
too eager
to kick the
shit out of
a forgotten poet
who blasphemed
one too many times.)

Chalk Marks on a Dead Soul

This picture is entitled "Chalk Tears" and it was created specifically for the verse below.

Chalk Marks on a Dead Soul

A prettiness mummified by years of chalk dust.
--Richard Eder

We would take turns
counting our sins
in chalk tally marks
on the alley wall
beside her church.

It evolved into a game that would last
from cloudburst to cloudburst.
(The goal was to see
who could amass the most sins
to be washed away by God.)

So when they lift
the fingerprints
from the bruises
found on her dead soul,
it is no surprise
they are mine.

The hunt leads them
to the alley by her church
Where I kneel
with rivulets of tears
streaking my chalk-covered cheeks,
praying for rain.