Are you a cat or bird,
devil or saint?
Villain and victim, dichotic romantic,
bruised and beaten, ostracised.
Bruised and beaten, demonised.
A willow bending against cruel fashion's wind.

A thousand storms of impotent hate,
jealousies and malignant complaints.
Rain like sonnets before the deaf!
As your gifts are pearl before swine.

And yet thy brow is regal still.
The profile of a demon prince -
no matter what shape taketh the face.
Be thou Quasimodo or Adonis by fate.
Whose smile has lit a thousand candles
in thankless, bitter hearts,
and fires in the hearths of freaks
who need but a spark to break the leash.

Or art thou Prince of Cats?
Yearning for the freedom to roam, to hunt.
Seeking pleasure, his mistresses pats.
The enemy of closed doors and cold paws.

Or could thou be a bird?
Clipped wings, a gilded cage,
whose song can only go so far.
If not let to glide into the night, to rise,
to greet the dawn with bleary, satisfied eyes.
Of one who has been given the chance to soar!
Or else to wilt, and yowl no more.

Once, far away, Andalusia of time.
Was I, this dreamer, this student of crime.
Devouring textbooks with a gluttonous glee.
Of masters I conversed with, with lives like movies.
FBI-profilers, psychopathologists.

Faces carved from paleo-lithic stone.

The hearts of sailors betrayed by Triton.
Their ill-fitting suits an anarchists cry.

Oh blessed hearts long since buried in the plots,
of victims whose killers would never see man’s courts.
Who knew the world and hoped to teach I,
this fresh young prey with a predator’s eye.
This fresh young prey with a predator’s eye.

Sat I with the masters, in those secret little rooms
where the dead are shuffled to have chosen for them a grave.

And it’s never more real than when the beast sits still.
In the agonising ordinary glow of the halogen buzz
that shines on guilty and innocent alike.

To reduce us all to such pathetic things.

That if not for the debt, this creature’s crimes
one could pity being on such obscene display.
If it were not known to me, in great detail
the river of misery and depravity he had left in his wake.

As a mugshot robs the aura, so too the well lit room.

And I understood why it took a much colder mind.

As even though I possessed all the faculties which
could follow and track and trap the prey;
the predator must also ****.

And being in those secret little rooms
I knew I could not see it through.

I left it to those stronger than I
and leave my mark through other designs.

He is an echo of my desire.
The moon reflected in a silver bowl.
A mantle of the finest mink
That slithers over the skin; and
Evokes memories of a touch long gone.

He is a cool breeze in November.
A drop of lemon on the tongue.
He is the taste of quiet pleasure,
circled in the scent of roasted coffee,
To be drowned by the high notes
of a fine whiskey.

He is the wilted rose that scent lingers on.
The dead petals in a basin,
Swirling lightly with my breath.
He is the locke of hair kept safe
In a scrapbook of dying memory
Yellowed by time.

He is a lover lost,
And in the losing
Grows sweeter still.

Fiend. Thou art a fiend.
A hunger.
Devouring everything.
A flexion of might against right.
A curse upon men.
Thou art the bitter taste that follows a sweet sip.
Thou art the cold hurt of love, and
Many would know you as
The wound of guilt
For many have fellated your dagger
And been ****** by your bullet
To stumble and fall from life
Into a death of shame and remorse
A thousand black horses trampling the mind
A black dog that tears away our legs
This fiend that pours lava into our eyes
Till we rust as ships beached
Upon the shores of unjust suffering
Thou art a demon, a prince of woe
Tool of the righteous
Stave of the shamed
Bid me not hello
And we will share nothing more
To be alone is bliss
To be lonely
Is to be alone with you

I died once, did you know?
Slow, painful
The death of a thousand lost little girls
The death of trust
****** into my heart
a pain
a pain unlike any other
smothering, breaking, beating and bruised
wearing black and blue like a fashion statement
a police statement
in line up, I died again
His eyes, his eyes
his hands
the knife, the fist, the finger
The dead ringer for love
let the door open wide
he crept, he pushed
He haunts my hurting heart and
The tattoo of his fingers on my flesh
burns to life with every wave of thought
triggered by a careless friend
A living, lonely, dead end
A post traumatic stress disorder
Be careful, be quick, escape the memories
The sounds, the smells
The shadow
the shadow
this beating heart, provokes in kind
the yearning for a peaceful mind
but I was killed and so I died
I rest in pain and terrified
I live, I journey, I am killed again
Day onto day and hellish night into night
There is no grave, yet buried I became
Ten years yesterday
The devil
lingers on

I had a dream once
Circular in reason
Teasing me
Bruised and beaten
Sleeping
I wandered angelic
Dorothy and Alice
Through nightmare geographies
Landscapes cruel, beautiful
And strange
Talking crows
Enveloped my eyes
A crown of pearlescent feathers
Obscuring my vision and yet
I saw
A waterfall of tears
A guru on a lotus
He whispered
Whiskey breath and sleepy eyed
A hep cat hipster in hemp cap
Gin and tonic gripped
Like a life preserver
“All you need is love”
And I wandered
Lost

Our skins fell before the moon
Where only flesh finds itself
Crimson drops and drips
Wet with desire
A hunger
Tongues dance, teeth nip
The grating of your skin
The heady scent of death and rebirth
The smooth sweet lapping
Gluttony
The moon casts shadows upon
A golden meeting
Reverie
As I kissed what should not be kissed
And you ate what was not supper
A kiss for love
A kiss for desire
And a kiss for hunger
We died and were reborn