desolation in the dark times

11/3/04

oil the color of death
collects in pools
on top of silver-hot
iron, the heat sandblasting my face
into betrayed crimson,
but it sits too long and scorches
the nostrils nervously tasting the stench of burning
raising above
in thunderheads of whipping acrid white

it’s the
battle-cry of straining climbs and
clashing steel
the one you’re deaf to, but
oh you can smell and see

and before my eyes it’s a scene
washed in grays, golds, smeared engine grease
and I find myself again a bit lost
in a faraway dream, wearing the helmet
of a roman warrior and riding the battlefields
under a bloated Gaulish sun
slaying
exacting my shining pearl hatred
on everything alive dead and barely slithering
gleefully leaping from my warhorse
and crushing beneath my steel heels
life and love
in a sea of red
while I laugh –
laugh like a madman
against a sky of blood
and an earth covered in sorrow
empty save for my raspy cackles
and those dead beneath me

it’s something I’d rather
cast back under the rug
but sometimes, oh how the wind will blow
and flare those tiny flames!
scorching the edge of the carpet and
revealing a bit of grease, and maybe
a tiny pool of black oil,
smoking like
the tiniest voice of a world going out