"THE BREAKDOWN COMES WHEN YOU STOP CONTROLLING YOURSELF / AND WANT THE RELEASE OF A BLOODBATH" - JENNY HOLZER

I. Vanitas Vanitatum
[The stage is set: a paper moon against a starless, greyscale sky. GINSBERG howls. He's nostalgic for all he'd assumed was forgotten; desperate to never recall it again. His numbered days are manufactured: ELIOT reclines, watching the world end.]

CHORUS OF PROPHETS:
In our own sins we trusted,
both in essence and in nature.
Hell was never an inferno:
it is an echo chamber.

We have nothing (-- we have nothing --)
but maxims and jumbled alphabets
and lightly-sparkling bitterness
when the cork pops feebly from the bottle;
(-- nothing! --) dripping saltine hate.

We've lived large and small, been tiny and tall;
always filling too much space in a too-big room
where our presence is ironically scarce.
There is nothing for you here,
bar vacant lungs and river water --
take a breath and join us
                               in sinking to
                                            (sinking!) the
                                               (sinking!) bottom
                                                  (sinking­,) of
                                                        (sinki­ng...) the
                                                             ­              Styx.

II. Et Omnia Vanitas
[Enter PLATH, SEXTON, WOOLF, BYRON, DICKINSON and VARIOUS PHARMACEUTICAL BRAND REPRESENTATIVES.]

You know not what you could be
but merely what you are
and that alone is traumatic enough.
Taste it, a slice at a time:

the disillusionment from having raised your hopes beyond rotting in the soil,
the anger upon realising this was your own fault and all you want to do is scream,
the bargaining, the denial, the scream (you were not born to live). The gradual processing. The scream!
Scream at the moon and scream at the walls and scream into pillows and howl and wail and hack away at the flesh and screech until plastic surroundings melt and it is only you and the void you willed upon yourself.

III. Epitaph (What Now?)
[A white-fur baby seal is camouflaged upon the ice
and, eyes closed, fools itself into thinking it survived.]

What happens next is no act of evil:
this is survival of the fittest.
We are bottom-rung of the food chain
and starving predators need to eat.

[We lick the ground and taste defeat.]

Ruby poppies reach heavenward --
small birds take their maiden flights.
I shrivel, putrid in the soil,
in the winter of my life.

poems are cheap they say, the supply exceeds the demand,
all are product of criminal mischief, and Lord, I know,
I’m one of the most thieving, most mischiefing ones

when no one was about, I scribbled many notes,
transplanted from my eyes, for a bottled voyage
to fallow beaches for sandy seeding

no matter IF these poems are from your womb ripped,
****** red concoctions of life’s cute cutting edge inscriptions,
no one cares re your titanic love’s labors, your children’s betrayal

no one cares from whence and wherefore they birthed,
all words, low class and progeny, not prodigy, of demeaning circumstances, best tossed back without much foolish hesitation

writ with pen tip of broken green glass from a parking lot,
the point I broke once more before my commencement,
inked from a wicked witch’s melted green spittle pooling alongside

poets of no way, falsely prophesying falsehoods most singularly bad,
waste not-want not, time better spent than reading rhymes of stolen disrepute and cloudy ownership and ignoble authorship

unless you among a blessed few, who see a full blown poem in glassine clarity, birthed fully formed Elton songs in a mouth full of amniotic fund, you, put down thy laboring eleven instruments

if words you claim of new parentage, you as the mother dear,
know there is nothing new under the sun, even these very words,
scripted by Israelite king whose tomb gone, he, too, poet forgotten

join me in a needle park of junkies who tried and failed, nickel bag
smoking budget dope words, in cigarettes of mostly discarded seeds and twigs, hallucinatory inhaling the same vision again & again

you refuse, naturally, glamming in notional newness, your arrogance, a plentiful commodity of wood-be writers by thousands buried in wooden caskets, under wooden inscription-less crosses

and of the trillion readers possible, to coloring picture books and instant grams, all have gone to the labor-free glancing look-see
of a seconds-short, lengthy meme, 10 second videos, 140 limitations

of the greatest, of Shakespeare and Coleridge, reader’s fast-dying, sunburned neurons reply; “free ***** of his Love’s Labour’s Lost, and the Ancient Mariner, overdue, free him too!”

ancients mock you aware that there be no verbal combination yet to foretell, what Lear said, that’s the the idea, “When we are born, we cry, that we are come to this great stage of fools.”^

fools we are, for there be no fore, the tale already told, once before & more, vaingloriously does this poet’s false vanity speak, so, so boisterously,  
“why my tale, why my tail, is as new as the oldest fossil”

lady of steel gaze:
let me learn your native tongue,
iron-clad and cold

Momentary
mourning peace.
Mama pours a glass of mulled wine,
lights a scented candle
                               (- "cherries on snow" -)
and drinks to ol' Joan.

Passed down with the jewellery box,
somewhere in the will, the daughters
receive the annual chore of roasting
the turkey (delicious!) and the veggies
(good job!) and (could you pass the?) breadsauce
for their brothers and husbands huddled
            on a threadbare sofa -- and a younger girl,
            barely there, staring at a laptop screen.

Mama's not festive - always too tired -
barely celebrates, but orchestrates.
Years barely there 'cause she's needed in their kitchen
and someone's gotta cook can she please get a hand? and
one chivalrous male puffs out his chest, takes one for the team, gestures to the girl with no discernible attention span and
half-laughs an "ay, one day this'll be you!
Best get in there while you're young!"

                                                       ­   ((A baritone chorus of laughter.))

"You outdid yourself on the turkey."
"S'great, ain't it? Pass the potatoes."

Sometimes here, sometimes Spain.
We stay over. It's tradition: we're
scattered across the country,
maid duties are the least she can do.
Never our kitchen or living room.
Tiny. Messy. Unwelcoming.
Come Boxing Day, Mama gives
a bear hug goodbye and an
"it's good to see you";
Because it is, she thinks.
Thank you for inviting me
to carry out your labour.
I'm just grateful to be needed.

A month of red 'SALE' tapes
scouring the clearance shelves;
overtime for extra cash
scraped to afford the food she cooks you;
paying half for gifts she'd brainstormed
while Dad buys partial credit on the gift tag.
We vanish from your house
- like elves -
by morning.

My lover asks me:
"What is the difference between me and the sky?"
The difference, my love,
Is that when you laugh,
I forget about the sky.

I dealt death today.

I know it’s a part of the job.
I know I’ve seen it too many times to count.
But today,
I felt it.

I left the room long after their family did.
There was no where I could go
To escape their

Roaring grief.

They were long gone.
And I was left with their precious baby.
I curled his arms and legs up
Closed his eyes
Wrapped him up gently.
With love and respect
Here he’ll sleep forever.

And oh,
They are so thankful,
That it was me
That I understood
That I was so careful
That I spent the time with them.

And you’re not supposed to take it with you.
You’re supposed to leave it
When they walk out the door
With one less goodbye.

But I took it with me today.

The way they felt before
The way they felt after
The long quiet goodbyes
The man in a suit on his knees weeping
The mother and son making a cocoon
Sheltering their dying baby.
The solemn face of the woman who plays god.
The green death.
The last breath.
The heaving of the living as he gave his last.
The waiting.
Slower rhythm.
Quieter.
‘He’s gone now’.

I watched the clock
The same way I had
An hour before
Waiting for death.

Soon as I could
I fled out the door
Ran into the street
Tried to outrun it

Instead I ran to you
I dialled your number
With shaking hands

I know I’m not supposed to
But all I wanted was you
Your voice

Ringing out
Thankfully
I wept alone.

Today I dealt death
And I found I am not strong enough
To sustain this
Alone
Or for long.

I found I still consider you my haven
Deep down
But that you are not my haven anymore
Or should be.

I listened to the silence
After the call rang out
And decided