Death Poems

Finn MacCoul

(1996)

Witness the warrior who falls,
the triumph of gravity spilling out his plans
dashing them against the rocks, red dreams
He holds his pen at a lazy angle,
dripping ink blood from a leaking wound.
He sheds faces like masks at midnight
revealing the puppeteer
"We are," he says, "memories and meat ghosts
of a primordial confusion."
Mean eyes reflect silhouettes
shadow you, shadow you
and the strange dream, you, stumbles on

"Not so," they say, "the painting is not about suicide,
but about stalemate."

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Remembermorse

(1995)

Ah, melancholy, my child and friend,
How I long to stuff you in a sack
and drop you bundled inna river.

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Raven

(1995)

A leather strap pulled taut,
Twisting back and forth

this is stretching me beyond bearing...

Too much.
Never enough.

Never enough.

The noise I make creaking in the wind

The squealing of veins
The groaning in the nails

Nether dreaming

This is leather screaming

Crawling sweat drips down salt
This is a pulling, this is straining

Black tape wraps tight

binding, blinding

I can't see straight.

This will tear me in two

Twice the grip
This will rip.

I will tear here.

Leather stresses. Leather black pulls.

This is it at last.

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Russian Roulette

(1996)

This is my chamber
my safe cave
the empty one.
Here I live
here I keep my head
This is where the me in me takes comfort.

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Ruby's Price

(1993)

She walks in misery, in spite of the knife
her pulse conceals a ragged hope
that opening won't let bubble out
sealed with gravity
she walks and no one parts the veil,
the shroud she cowers in.

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It Only Ever Costs What You're Willing To Pay

(1994)

Crimsoned,
Agamemnon stood
with his great knife
and looked up
at the beaten, warped, copper
mirror on the wall
opposite
and Medea's eyes
flashed

slashed

cut
into his face.
He shook

unsobered

but knew he'd

done

as he had to
to hold his own
to hold his edge
to stay ahead
to keep his head
above water.
With eyes and smile and silence
Medea mocked him
from his watery reflection
as was her right.
He'd gained nothing
except the chance
to do it all again.

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Anticlimax

(1994)

I'm still ringing, ringing
and I'm clinging,
Slipping
and
Once, I know,
when dread blood ran
through my painful veins,
I would have raged, caged
rattled and throttled
my driven nature driving
a response commensurate
'Cause you see
I see
I see
Icy cold you
stinging me
Scorpion you
teasing me
And he'd boil
Just under the skin,
the blooded, hurtable me.
No manic hate
but anger still
that would have let you know I lived.
Now, I think it's just...
coming in reverse.

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At long Last

(1995)

I'm tired now and

I'm going to go, so

Let me explain to you, my love

Let me just say this once:

He fell, the hard way, and then

He was dead, okay?

No last wishes from him

No last words or nothing

Not using the body at all

Not at all.

So I had a use for it

So I picked it up.

I was, I don't know,

I was thinking I could help.

His mouth I opened and

His eyes I opened and

You were there, weeping, cursing her red hair

You sat on the stones, shaking with lost gravity

And

And

Nothing's been the same since, sweetie,

Nothing's been better.

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Self Abuse

(1995)

Me? I'm
Lost, and my bootheel's worn down,
My bitter boy.
My lovely son.
Tiny, tiny grave.

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Something in the Book

(1992)

I swallowed it
and
like a grenade
it took its time
grenade time- lead stomach lined
white phosphorous
bang and flare
distorted the skin
and wouldn't stop burning
plugged up
I was
fucked up
like a trooper
but I kept it
in
put no fingers down my throat
waited for it to damp
die
but fire tonic built up
and raged
bubbled
against the blisterskin
lead walls red to white.
but my throat:
the seals held
firm
like they were made to
like Thermopylae
when the bodies piled up,
waited at the gates,
waited outside Hades,
waited for the flames.
flexi-meat metal heats,
weakens.
and when the time
bomb inside me
sorry
when the time
comes
I'll
take pliers
and fish out
the stopper.
Wait for the flames.
it'll rumble up
licking
flash burn each cell
bursts
lava down my neck
crisping, running
flowering sores
hot white jet
combustion
consumption
and me being born
I will rise
with night wings
but the flame's too hot
I collapse
choke on searing air
my new wings burst
into red pain
my rebirth
too much this time
unbearable heat
hammers in my chest
as the flesh
evaporates
my bones
brittle crack peel
and collapse around the gem.

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Dangerous Habits

(1992)

You can't write with a barbed-wire wristwatch;
your pen's a half-inch too high,
and the blood, I just shouldn't mention

Driving at night,

a bag over my head,

it's not something I do every day.
But you should see the looks I get,
cuz, well, I can't.

When the headache's real bad,
I put cool palms against my eyes
and
it's really not that tough
to go the distance with my thumbs.

I call you late

with Gin and Water

caressing my throat and whispering to you
and I let you answer

I let you whisper back at me.

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The Good Neighbor

(1992)

Monday
I've got a headache

He's got a dog

I've got a headache

She's got a song

Wednesday
I've got a rock

He's got a head

I've got a rock

She's got an eye

Friday
I've got a bomb

He's got a car

I've got a bomb

She's got a key

I've got time

I've got time

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Reunify

(1992)

It's a burnt hair moment
a sort of town reunion
we're all must be related anyway
cows at the school for chrissakes
anyway it's been years since I've been her
number one and I don't remember
the names but it doesn't matter
I see her across the dusty way
sitting on hay or something
but the road wildly widens
and my legs can't carry a vicious weight
or the chip on my shoulder
I trip and limp and it's too much finally
so I'm down on my knees half-crawling
as it still hurts lurching towards her
and her three-stacker pancaked mother
she's still the same even above me
as I crumble and stumble trying a smile on
with dignity flying in tatters fallen.

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The Moment After

(1992)

Fingers knobbed around the glass
Lips pulled back from overlong teeth
Shut eyes sunken further, rolling in the skull
A sigh whistling through harsh red lungs
Black boots tapping once on the softened floor
Defeated and drooling candle blown by a careless wind

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The Watcher

(1992)

I'm going to wait until he takes off his hat

The hat, yes,
That will be the cue

Outside, the wind stops
like the singing, shaving man who's just seen
the door swing open and his brief date
peek in.

It's a Fedora of a sort
that you don't see anymore
except, of course, right now.

The cold cramp in my left leg
came back an hour ago
and the belt digs canyons
into my thighs. Did I bring too much?

He will raise it
to say Hello
to some pretty young Irish girl.
He must.

I wonder, will the stain
be there for weeks?
The sidewalk is so clean right now
and the man in the grey pants
works so hard.

Does he know
how lucky he is
that there is no itch
upon his scalp?
How lucky - to have a hat?

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Traveler

(1992)

The explosion took my face.
The doctors set me up.
The nurse said I could go.
I packed my bags
and shrugged good-bye.
The last crucified man
to climb, stiff-armed
slowly from bank to bank,
along the clouds of heaven,
I hear glistening strings.
I smell ice-cold juniper.
I never look down.
I am
pogo-sticking my martyred way home.

I pass through, to my surprise,
gold and ivory, not pearl.
And The Father waits on his side
for his broken boy.
Divine arms open wide
(mirror to my own)
and the smile reaches my eyes
but never touches his.

I have
some questions for you
but seem
to have
forgotten
where I put them.
And I can't
check my pockets

or scratch my nose.

And the smile reaches my eyes
but never touches his.
He asks me
what happened to my face.
I ask him
what happened to yours?

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Byron

(1992)

Draw Breath
Drip Ink
Drop Dead

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After Time

(1992)

You're a nice guy, Jack.
It doesn't stop me
from wanting to machine gun you
See you dodge
left
and then have a high-temperature tear
rip at your shoulder and puppet you upright
to catch another with your cheek,
gouging you a smile I can live with
A staccato on your chest
wet whistles as the air rushes out
and gouts of viscous blood
exploding from your back.
I want you torn to gobbets
one
deliberate
frame
at
a
time.

But
I grow
weary,
forgiving.
you're not always in my sights
Heavens Above, most days there's a sunset
every one a backhanded miracle
the water's good to drink
and the beer's not bad, either
I have warm sheets
and a cool pillow
comfort can be taken
in all of that
I can stop shifting
I can air out my mind
I can let my dogs sleep
I can rest my tinny, aching arms

But sidewise my eyes reveal
your hand
in every web, in every tree
I can see
your laugh pricks
your comfort grates
your casual grace offends
your unforgivable smile intrudes
And someone puts the machine gun back in my hand
Say goodnight, Gracie.

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deus ex

(1992)

He thrust it into me
the Word of God
without provocation
unceasing theology
without lubrication
His breath a constant whisper
hot Flood of spittle on my back
His coaxing and commanding
driving me
rigid and hallowed
whole, hale and hollowed.
To create his holy art
He blew through me
and He blew in me
and He blew me
He blew me til I cracked.

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My Destiny

(1992)

You will pass again to roll me finally flat, I hope
Azure pressed-leather suit stretched tight and square
I can be cut into strips of length
which will make it easy for quinine solution
to wash over me and make me suitable
roll onto your walls and stay there
fill up every corner and turn attention inward
I'll wait on your walls
watching
peel when you get bored sometime
and give me something to bleed about.

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Back to Behemoth...or back to The Castle.

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Poetry © 1992-1996 Mark Anthony Masterson

Those who write can drop a line to misterdark@mail.oocities.com