Cemetery of Unbecoming

 I'm in a holding pattern, 

turning in unending circles

 despite myself 

Chasing tail through unlearned lessons

 in determined quest to bite myself.

Spending days in distraction

 finding ways not to hurt myself.

Re-living debauched memories 

in urgent search to find myself.

This is the Cemetery of Unbecoming 

Buried seeds of lust and longing

Unmarked passes made and missing

Moldering in bargain bins

While single magpie loveless sings.

Muddy boots, palms blistering

I'll take a little risk again

Disinter this interest and

Allow myself a fix again

Basest of humanity; 

faceless forms flick rapidly

through catalogues of flesh on screens;

engorge on empty lechery.

Perspectives over-pinned and tucked;

present the organs you want sucked 

or maybe you will do the sucking…

Anything to break the fucking 

tedium.

And if not flesh; what then, what's next?

Which path to clear a heart perplexed?

To undermine a mind obsessed 

with poisons?

 I can't destroy them 

After all the things they've done, 

Ever-present accompaniment 

Greasing the slips, licking their lips

Instilling distillery dictatorship 

Placing their bets while I plant my regrets

Supplanting my honour with guilty cold sweats.

Necromantical nectar 

Throat golden with glamour.

This pyre of promises - 

 beacon of rancour.

Flare in the fumes of a belly distended

Expose silhouette of your soul villipended

And scorched scarlet afterglow cheeks unrepentant 

Luminate languishing lustful intentions.

The fuel for destruction’s the same as creation.

Energy unspent explodes in frustration.

Perseid Nights

The gift of a science celestial.

It’s the atmosphere’s firework festival.

The night is a warm one, breath-catchingly clear

with the galaxy’s profile an ethereal smear.

Cricked necks and curses at errant headlights

as space detritus burns up in the heights.

But,

beware, beware

adoringly gawping,

star-strickenly fawning

ignoring the floor

and where you’re walking

‘cause you’re outside, right?

And on these humid Summer nights

your every step is beset by

slugs.

These slithy gherkins

lurking; determinedly

mucously marking their paths

Those hobos hopefully hunting

sustenance

by the garden fence

are often tragically reduced

to a smear

less ethereal and more entrails.

When we noticed all our potential victims

of heavy footed murder, we picked, toe-tipping

across the pitch-dark path, therein

turning eyes to earth and star-sights missing.

It occurred to me the verse of learning is hidden in everyday things.

For if we live for the spectacular

we risk that sickening crack you hear

when crushing Sluggy’s cousin

to oblivious oblivion.

Similarly,

if we diligently

avoid this genocidal killing spree

we miss all the good stuff.

With eyes for the earth

and cricked necks and curses at the errant soles’ hurt.

There must be equilibrium.

At the hem of the horizon

the cleaving beam of the valiant beacon,

halfway between there and back again.

This suffocating compromise blinds us

to both wonder and loss.

When faced with this decision

I find I’d rather play

a game of sluggish hopscotch

and watch meteors when I may.

I’ll give you back your even keel,

your solid, dependable lighthouse deal

I’ll reel

with my nadirs and zeniths instead.

For as long as I’m feeling

I know I’m not dead.