some kind of permanence
a ****** in the
woods

slow decomposition
tender restoration

it's place a drift
as if
coalescence made it
float through trees

within. the charcoal maker
the makers wife
and scurrying creatures
with feet and paws

without. smoke. wisps of
first industry leading to
harvested piles seasoning
by breathing clamps.

points of turf covering
designed stacks. an inferno
strangled by it's master
briar hanging loosely
tasting tobacco while listening
for betraying crackles and looking
for beacons of yellow showing as cracks
in dried earth.

fire here is burning money.
burning time

they have none to spare

behind him stacked in sacks
charcoal dry and ready for
Jack the cannon maker.

where finally the fire suppressed by
the maker would burn in forced
air with anger enough to
melt iron. Blast the sky with
sparks and toast Jack's leather.

in the woods the smoke rise and fell
while the master
vent
seals
vent
seals

the whispering clamps
in a clearing.

shingle
varnished
by seawater
fade as
dried salts
prove the
Sun's mettle

hungry
children
by beach play
quieten
when chips
polystyrene
pools salt
and vinegar

sharp
defences
cut bare feet
sharpened
nerve endings
paddling out
in salty sea

you dared.
the night ruby.
tight furled and guarded
by fangs lined
green and brown.

you came.
a delight in
in light unwrapping
moistened by
drops of a
dawn that rolled
your curves.
shimmered in
your folds.

you held.
on my
darkening bleed, spoilt
and drying hard,
on your soft
vermilions.
*****, holding
you too tight.

Turning to Uncle Dai I wanted to speak
but

Motes flew sticking to his hat, greasy
and soot blackened. Third generation
drivers hat made from good dirt.

Embers, hot, stole the air from lungs.
They orange stars underfoot so
surely had the tunnel transported
us to the Southern hemisphere.

Steam and boiling water releasing
valves, driving pistons after clanging
gates. Ruled over all and any
utterance
until

That single silence born on the
flash of ivory in the fireman's
face. Son of the driver. To
I playing role of grandson
to follow
and

Dai's dar something in
the smoke.

tears have welled me
curtailed
cut up
cupped

pure hope is
they remain
vesselled.

in me or in vial.

as tears dry inside me
the one dropped in
glass
is just water

the others ache
behind
vitreous

lips part, two strings, the puppet master yanks
in eager yearning to see her smile,
he laughs at the blood spilling down her cheeks
she laughs back. spitting and swallowing in turn
biting on hooks. shift to point; she spins.
wires tense straining at any held purpose.

gritted and mounted to station wires
cut deep into flesh, fat through bone
until cracking free to fly with severed
manipulators and flowing blood.

the stage set slippery. sanguine
Bambi skids and falls. Disney
without the artifice. The mother seen
to die the exhilaration of death vivid
in the killers eyes.

the final cut. hooks join chummed
with jowl and tongue.

as one the audience stand.
****** silent.
faces lit with praise are but stitched arcs
applause a vacancy of hands.



............................
The writers Iniquity and MrQuipty
collaborate again
©

lines mark boundaries
scratched by gunship
cannon fire
crossed regardless by
their smoke .

preserved on haze made
horizon from concrete
ministries bunkering
a fissionable peace.

avant garde fighters
control as shoeless
fashionistas
brokering fear in a
'retro' style of blades
and system spooks.

working poor garb
in fake labels
preferring sim-culottes
to any daring
protests against
themselves.

we are all Benetton
and on message hating
colour or hating the
hating of colour.hungry
habits of the two tones
chimed by the 'we all bleed
the same' brigades.

shop the same, perhaps.

standing in queues behind
logos made of corporate
programming dependant
on the modern gunship
smoke territorying our
lives.

we are all under arms.