What is death, I ask.
What is life, you ask.
I give them both my buttocks,
my two wheels rolling off toward Nirvana.
They are neat as a wallet,
opening and closing on their coins,
the quarters, the nickels,
straight into the crapper.
Why shouldn't I pull down my pants
and moon the executioner
as well as paste raisins on my *******?
Why shouldn't I pull down my pants
and show my little ***** to Tom
and Albert? They wee-wee funny.
I wee-wee like a squaw.
I have ink but no pen, still
I dream that I can **** in God's eye.
I dream I'm a boy with a zipper.
It's so practical, la de dah.
The trouble with being a woman, Skeezix,
is being a little girl in the first place.
Not all the books of the world will change that.
I have swallowed an orange, being woman.
You have swallowed a ruler, being man.
Yet waiting to die we are the same thing.
Jehovah pleasures himself with his axe
before we are both overthrown.
Skeezix, you are me. La de dah.
You grow a beard but our drool is identical.

Forgive us, Father, for we know not.

Today is November 14th, 1972.
I live in Weston, Mass., Middlesex County,
U.S.A., and it rains steadily
in the pond like white puppy eyes.
The pond is waiting for its skin.
the pond is waiting for its leather.
The pond is waiting for December and its Novocain.

It begins:

Interrogator:
What can you say of your last seven days?

Anne:
They were tired.

Interrogator:
One day is enough to perfect a man.

Anne:
I watered and fed the plant.

*

My undertaker waits for me.
he is probably twenty-three now,
learning his trade.
He'll stitch up the gren,
he'll fasten the bones down
lest they fly away.
I am flying today.
I am not tired today.
I am a motor.
I am cramming in the sugar.
I am running up the hallways.
I am squeezing out the milk.
I am dissecting the dictionary.
I am God, la de dah.
Peanut butter is the American food.
We all eat it, being patriotic.

Ms. Dog is out fighting the dollars,
rolling in a field of bucks.
You've got it made if you take the wafer,
take some wine,
take some bucks,
the green papery song of the office.
What a jello she could make with it,
the fives, the tens, the twenties,
all in a goo to feed the baby.
Andrew Jackson as an hors d'oeuvre,
la de dah.
I wish I were the U.S. Mint,
turning it all out,
turtle green
and monk black.
Who's that at the podium
in black and white,
blurting into the mike?
Ms. Dog.
Is she spilling her guts?
You bet.
Otherwise they cough...
The day is slipping away, why am I
out here, what do they want?
I am sorrowful in November...
(no they don't want that,
they want bee stings).
Toot, toot, tootsy don't cry.
Toot, toot, tootsy good-bye.
If you don't get a letter then
you'll know I'm in jail...
Remember that, Skeezix,
our first song?

Who's thinking those things?
Ms. Dog! She's out fighting the dollars.
Milk is the American drink.
Oh queens of sorrows,
oh water lady,
place me in your cup
and pull over the clouds
so no one can see.
She don't want no dollars.
She done want a mama.
The white of the white.

Anne says:
This is the rainy season.
I am sorrowful in November.
The kettle is whistling.
I must butter the toast.
And give it jam too.
My kitchen is a heart.
I must feed it oxygen once in a while
and mother the mother.

*

Say the woman is forty-four.
Say she is five seven-and-a-half.
Say her hair is stick color.
Say her eyes are chameleon.
Would you put her in a sack and bury her,
**** her down into the dumb dirt?
Some would.
If not, time will.
Ms. Dog, how much time you got left?
Ms. Dog, when you gonna feel that cold nose?
You better get straight with the Maker
cuz it's coming, it's a coming!
The cup of coffee is growing and growing
and they're gonna stick your little doll's head
into it and your lungs a gonna get paid
and your clothes a gonna melt.
Hear that, Ms. Dog!
You of the songs,
you of the classroom,
you of the pocketa-pocketa,
you hungry mother,
you spleen baby!
Them angels gonna be cut down like wheat.
Them songs gonna be sliced with a razor.
Them kitchens gonna get a boulder in the belly.
Them phones gonna be torn out at the root.
There's power in the Lord, baby,
and he's gonna turn off the moon.
He's gonna nail you up in a closet
and there'll be no more Atlantic,
no more dreams, no more seeds.
One noon as you walk out to the mailbox
He'll ****** you up --
a wopman beside the road like a red mitten.

There's a sack over my head.
I can't see. I'm blind.
The sea collapses.
The sun is a bone.
Hi-** the derry-o,
we all fall down.
If I were a fisherman I could comprehend.
They fish right through the door
and pull eyes from the fire.
They rock upon the daybreak
and amputate the waters.
They are beating the sea,
they are hurting it,
delving down into the inscrutable salt.

*

When mother left the room
and left me in the *******
and sent away my kitty
to be fried in the camps
and took away my blanket
to wash the me out of it
I lay in the soiled cold and prayed.
It was a little jail in which
I was never slapped with kisses.
I was the engine that couldn't.
Cold wigs blew on the trees outside
and car lights flew like roosters
on the ceiling.
Cradle, you are a grave place.

Interrogator:
What color is the devil?

Anne:
Black and blue.

Interrogator:
What goes up the chimney?

Anne:
Fat Lazarus in his red suit.

Forgive us, Father, for we know not.

Ms. Dog prefers to sunbathe ****.
Let the indifferent sky look on.
So what!
Let Mrs. Sewal pull the curtain back,
from her second story.
So what!
Let United Parcel Service see my parcel.
La de dah.
Sun, you hammer of yellow,
you hat on fire,
you honeysuckle mama,
pour your blonde on me!
Let me laugh for an entire hour
at your supreme being, your Cadillac stuff,
because I've come a long way
from Brussels sprouts.
I've come a long way to peel off my clothes
and lay me down in the grass.
Once only my palms showed.
Once I hung around in my woolly tank suit,
drying my hair in those little meatball curls.
Now I am clothed in gold air with
one dozen halos glistening on my skin.
I am a fortunate lady.
I've gotten out of my pouch
and my teeth are glad
and my heart, that witness,
beats well at the thought.

Oh body, be glad.
You are good goods.

*

Middle-class lady,
you make me smile.
You dig a hole
and come out with a sunburn.
If someone hands you a glass of water
you start constructing a sailboat.
If someone hands you a candy wrapper,
you take it to the book binder.
Pocketa-pocketa.

Once upon a time Ms. Dog was sixty-six.
She had white hair and wrinkles deep as splinters.
her portrait was nailed up like Christ
and she said of it:
That's when I was forty-two,
down in Rockport with a hat on for the sun,
and Barbara drew a line drawing.
We were, at that moment, drinking *****
and ginger beer and there was a chill in the air,
although it was July, and she gave me her sweater
to bundle up in. The next summer Skeezix tied
strings in that hat when we were fishing in Maine.
(It had gone into the lake twice.)
Of such moments is happiness made.

Forgive us, Father, for we know not.

Once upon a time we were all born,
popped out like jelly rolls
forgetting our fishdom,
the pleasuring seas,
the country of comfort,
spanked into the oxygens of death,
Good morning life, we say when we wake,
hail mary coffee toast
and we Americans take juice,
a liquid sun going down.
Good morning life.
To wake up is to be born.
To brush your teeth is to be alive.
To make a bowel movement is also desireable.
La de dah,
it's all routine.
Often there are wars
yet the shops keep open
and sausages are still fried.
People rub someone.
People copulate
entering each other's blood,
tying each other's tendons in knots,
transplanting their lives into the bed.
It doesn't matter if there are wars,
the business of life continues
unless you're the one that gets it.
Mama, they say, as their intestines
leak out. Even without wars
life is dangerous.
Boats spring leaks.
Cigarettes explode.
The snow could be radioactive.
Cancer could ooze out of the radio.
Who knows?
Ms. Dog stands on the shore
and the sea keeps rocking in
and she wants to talk to God.

Interrogator:
Why talk to God?

Anne:
It's better than playing bridge.

*

Learning to talk is a complex business.
My daughter's first word was utta,
meaning button.
Before there are words
do you dream?
In utero
do you dream?
Who taught you to ****?
And how come?
You don't need to be taught to cry.
The soul presses a button.
Is the cry saying something?
Does it mean help?
Or hello?
The cry of a gull is beautiful
and the cry of a crow is ugly
but what I want to know
is whether they mean the same thing.
Somewhere a man sits with indigestion
and he doesn't care.
A woman is buying bracelets
and earrings and she doesn't care.
La de dah.

Forgive us, Father, for we know not.

There are stars and faces.
There is ketchup and guitars.
There is the hand of a small child
when you're crossing the street.
There is the old man's last words:
More light! More light!
Ms. Dog wouldn't give them her buttocks.
She wouldn't moon at them.
Just at the killers of the dream.
The bus boys of the soul.
Or at death
who wants to make her a mummy.
And you too!
Wants to stuf her in a cold shoe
and then amputate the foot.
And you too!
La de dah.
What's the point of fighting the dollars
when all you need is a warm bed?
When the dog barks you let him in.
All we need is someone to let us in.
And one other thing:
to consider the lilies in the field.
Of course earth is a stranger, we pull at its
arms and still it won't speak.
The sea is worse.
It comes in, falling to its knees
but we can't translate the language.
It is only known that they are here to worship,
to worship the terror of the rain,
the mud and all its people,
the body itself,
working like a city,
the night and its slow blood
the autumn sky, mary blue.
but more than that,
to worship the question itself,
though the buildings burn
and the big people topple over in a faint.
Bring a flashlight, Ms. Dog,
and look in every corner of the brain
and ask and ask and ask
until the kingdom,
however queer,
will come.

THE STORY OF SARA

CHAPTER 5: THE PARTY IS DESTROYED




The meeting ended and I walked out not knowing my fate.  
  I felt scared for the first time.
  Surely, Omar's people would be coming after me?
  And what about those others whom Omar had just expelled? They will be after my blood too!
  My God, I began to think all over again at his last speech. He demanded the expulsion of twenty five per cent of party members – and God knows what would happen to them, whilst I, Sara, was the chief of the Purification Programme.
Obviously, as the 'leader' of the programme and being 'found' to be a 'traitor', then I would meet the most brutal end?
  Maybe, I was being too paranoid.
  Maybe all this talk about killing was just idle threat used by Omar to intimidate us?
  But I was still scared and I needed to escape.
  I decided to leave my house; but where could I go?
  I knew that that there was no one better than Sanji, but since I did cut him off, where does that leave me?
  Will he accept me back?
  I went to his house and rang the bell.
  The sad fact as that I did not have one single 'friend' that I could depend on!


  Sure enough, there was Sanji.
  "Hi" I said shyly.
  "You're in trouble I assume?"
  As usual, he was right.
He motioned me with a pleasant smile to come inside.
  "I mean, what did you expect from Omar?" Sanji asked me; "Sara you knew perfectly well what Omar stood for: dictatorship and ******. So who's to blame here?"
    "I do?" I replied sarcastically.
  "With respect to Omar, are you seriously going to tell me that no one knew that he was a murderer?"
  I sat quiet.
  I didn't know what to say.
  "Well?" Sanji asked. "You knew Sara; you knew and yet there you were with him, and there you were carrying out his orders. So, who's pretending now Sara?"
  Again, I sat still.
  What could I say?
  To be honest, I didn't feel guilty about what I had done, rather, I was embarrassed because Sanji was right, and I couldn't admit it!
  "Look Sanji," I finally managed to paste some words together, "will you allow me to stay with you?"
  "Of course," the soft spoken Sanji replied. "My God, I know the dogs are out to get you, and I'm not going to leave you on the streets. You didn't have to ask."
  I was so utterly relieved, I broke all the rules, and now I was finding safety, and I couldn't help but hugging the somewhat startled Sanji!



With the declaration by Omar of 'Unrestricted Warfare', the government suddenly, under a newly elected leader, decided to go on the offensive against not only Omar's party but against any so-called 'illegal' party.
  The new Prime Minister was the most serious, straight-forward man that I had ever seen.
  He was determined to remove all the leftist parties and individual leaders based on the law, because, for him, the country had had enough of our ‘disruptions, illegal activities and chaotic actions.
He declared in a speech on the day of assuming office that a new era will now begin in our country.
  "No more of these shadowy, secretive, cult-like so-called 'political' parties, for we shall chase them out and put the guilty ones straight into jail, which is their real homes. I pledge to you, as I did, many times, during my campaign, that we shall not be meek in the face of these disruptive and criminal characters; force will be met with force, and by ‘force’, I mean the law. I solemnly declare to you, the law shall not be undermined by these dangerous, subversive elements within our society. The law shall be preserved, and more to the point, the law will go into action, because, if we do not seriously act, then the very edifice of our entire political and legal establishment will be at risk."
  So, the Pigs were now going to destroy all our parties – and all because Omar brought so much disrepute and disgrace to us. I felt scared from our new Prime Minister, just as I was scared from the gangs of Omar.
  And, yet, strangely enough, I couldn’t help but admire this new Prime Minister!
  How odd and paradoxical of me!
  I knew what attracted me to his character: his force of personality. He was a solemn, self assured man, who simply decided that our country needed bold, swift, decisive action against what he regarded as ‘irresponsible’ elements in our society.
  In that sense, he was completely different from the other Prime Ministers, who treated us, as nothing more than clowns and jesters.
  But, this Prime Minister was really right, when he ran his election campaign, based on his promise that he would get rid of us – and the people enthusiastically approved of his sincerity and seriousness in his determination, if elected, to wipe us out!


  The Prime Minister, continued:
  "And so, I say to you tonight that we too, shall initiate our legally based police action against these criminal gangs – yes, I deliberately call them ‘criminals’, because they are no different from any other gangs, such as, for example, narcotic gangs. For far too long, this nation has been far too patient in putting up with so-called 'freedom of expression' that these so-called parties espouse. Yes, but 'freedom of expression' does not mean inciting violence and destroying public property and randomly killing innocent men and women! I say, and thanks to you, the public, who voted for us to handle and solve this crises, I say to you all, that we shall no longer tolerate this state of utter chaos in our land," and his audience thunderously began to applaud and cheer, "we shall not stand one more minute for this sorry state of affairs. These so-called 'revolutionary' parties have only one principle and that is to create disturbances, mass chaos and ultimately violence. They are nothing but murderous thugs and clearly no civilized society and no self-respecting civilisation on this planet can possibly accept the existence of such criminal gangs and that is precisely why we shall use every legal method to completely eliminate these people.”
  It was obvious to me, that we were no longer ‘popular’ with the masses.
  Otherwise, how did this bold Prime Minister get elected by such an overwhelming majority of the voters?
  No, I had to face the new reality, and that was our movement, was no longer acceptable to the majority of our people.
  And, it was completely our fault, because we began to behave with unrestrained lunacy, by hurting and endlessly insulting, using the most derogatory words against practically every segment of society, and by raging against every type of worker, from the ******* collectors to the managers of factories, and to the owners of any business; by randomly damaging and destroying public and private property, especially what people most cared for, such as their homes, their cars and their businesses; by our endless chaotic riots and marches, that would disrupt and paralyze the business and every other activity – such as hospitals, for example - of an entire city.  And then there were the random murders of innocent people, that we somehow decided were not ‘pure’ enough for us – that really offended our society, as well.


  Then, I noticed, the Prime Minister was still speaking:
“And so, tonight, I appeal to you, the members of these ridiculous, criminal so-called parties. I calmly ask each and everyone one of you, men and women, to quietly leave your respective illegal parties, so as to save yourselves from further prosecution by our noble courts. I am giving you nothing less than twenty four hours to exit from these gangster parties. This will be your last chance to rehabilitate yourself back to decency and respectability. Now, this is my first day in office, and I am proud to be solemnly fulfilling my pledge, that I gave to my people, if elected - and I have been duly elected, and so to my pledge, I remain as faithful as ever. So, let this be my first and last warning to you members of these so-called 'parties': leave within 24 hours or else face the full might of our law, because, soon, all too soon, you shall soon see yourselves, and no doubt, your other comrades, in prison, and you will thereby be assigned to the dustbins of history. I tell you this much, and listen, for those of you who have ears: Your time is up! The murderous chaos that you have perpetrated is over! Resign or be bludgeoned by the forces of decency and morality; no more fear for all our law abiding men and women, who have been for far too long intimidated by the likes of you! Your insane, sick era is over, and I say to you members of these murderous gangsters, and to all you decent, law abiding citizens, goodnight; for, tomorrow you shall see a revitalized nation that is finally safe from fear! Tomorrow, you shall all see a country that abides by proper laws and not a country that seemed to be going down the path of mafia rule!"
  Well, what a speech indeed.
  The time for our chaotic mischief was over.
  
  Obviously, I wasn't a fool; I fully realized that this was the first Pig government that was going to deal with us in a deadly serious manner.  
  Or maybe I'm wrong.
  Maybe this Prime Minister is talking ******* – like all the other politicians.
  Once they get in office, they betray every word they said during the election campaign.
  Well, actually, who knows?
  I felt depressed.
  Was this really the end of our great movement?
  Was it really 'true' the masses no longer 'liked' us?
  And if so, then why would they turn against us?
  After all wasn't our entire epic struggle for the masses? Why would they betray us; we were and are their only saviours and their only salvation, so why would they vote for this avowedly hard line politician and put him in office?
  I was completely confused; what was going to happen to our great struggle?
  Wasn’t our great war for the liberation of the masses from the claws of the Pigs?
  Could it possibly be that all our sacrifices shall now be in vain?
  My God, didn’t the masses, the people realize that we were fighting for them?!
  We sacrificed our entire lives for them, and now they were going to betray us?
  What does that say about Humanity?

      

  Within a few days of the Prime Ministers' speech, it became quite evident that he meant exactly what he intended to do.
  Soon, the police were out in force, arresting anyone involved in the numerous anti-Pig parties.
  All over the country, the police came after every known party member; they were arrested and sent to the police station, to await court.
  The same went for individual known leaders of the party.
  The courts were, themselves, very swift in deciding the verdict, since, I can only assume, it wasn’t that difficult to see if a particular party member had committed a crime or not.
  Presumably, the police had kept numerous files on all of us and on all our individual activities?
  And, I must admit, that I was surprised at how lenient the courts were for the majority of those prosecuted were released as innocent from any crimes.
  Most were acquitted, but for those who participated in acts of public and private property damage, they were given a few months in jail.
  As for those who gave inflammatory, pro-violence, hate filled speeches, like Tony, were given up to one year in jail.

  However, Omar was in no mood to be conciliatory, which also surprised me.
  He went into hiding, rather than surrendering himself.
  He appeared in a televised appearance in front of about twenty of his followers.
  How different the scene was!
  For, hadn't we been used to seeing Omar in front of hundreds of thousands of screaming fans before?
  And now, he was speaking to a mere twenty or so of his followers!
  "Members of our party. Greetings to you all, ladies and gentlemen. Yes, I know that the people who are listening and watching, will be asking why I am not in front of thousand of our party members. You see, I'm aware of what you out there are thinking."
  My God, the leader is happily telling us that his 'knowledge' told him as to what we are thinking, as concerns why his audience is so small.
  And, he looked as if that was a great insight on his part!
  What *******!
  Any fool, would be thinking that!
  "Well, my followers, my true, faithful followers I shall speak the truth. Following our great, revolutionary self-cleansing programme, we discovered, as I, of course, had always predicted, that regrettably, amidst our own so-called 'party members', there existed a huge malignant and spreading cancer. A lethal type of cancer. It was there right in the hearts and minds of quite of few of our so-called 'members'. Once our doctors discovered this fact, which I knew about, I decided to act immediately, ruthlessly and without hesitation. I had to amputate every cancerous form within the party and, I can tell you it was done superbly and with absolute surgical precision! Yes, we removed the cancer successfully, and today, our party members are completely free from any Pig attributes!"
  The small crowd applauded and tried to scream their pleasure, but it was a far cry from his previous speeches when the roar of the audience was deafening.
  Of course, my question was, what was point in what he was saying?
  The fact was that his movement and his followers were now no more!
  Omar was finished; his party was dead, and he’s happily telling us about ‘removing the cancer’?!
  I then noticed, that Omar was still talking:
  "Having cleansed the party, I, Omar, ordered a new type of warfare against the criminal leaders that rule our nation. Of course, these criminals are ruling our nation to its death. That is why we must wage this great, humanistic and eternally just war. I ordered a new phase: the Unrestricted Warfare principle and that meant, in effect, that we shall use whatever means it was necessary to gain the supreme victory. The new government of Satanical vipers now decided to fight us with a new ferocity that was thus far unheard of. In other words, no Prime Minister, has so far used such savage methods in the war.”
  What ‘savagery was he talking about?!
  The Prime minister simply used the police forces to arrest party members, and they then had to face the courts.
  Where was this most unusually ‘savage’ form of warfare?


  I snapped out of my thoughts:
“But do not worry, because we soldiers are used to the most unimaginable viciousness on the part of the enemy, and their sick methods will not repulse us; on the contrary, these inhuman methods of war, will only strengthen our resolve, will and determination to exterminate this enemy no matter what it costs in blood and tears.”
  Again, he was just repeating the same, old slogans, that were completely empty of any worthy content.
  “And so, you ask me, tonight, where are we in this war? Who's winning? I am happy to report to you: that our pure soldiers have moved from battle to battle, from victory to victory; and, all this is thanks to the purity within their hearts and souls.”
  What was he talking about!?
  I felt like screaming and laughing at the same time; for the sheer incomparable idiocy of Omar’s words, made him sound like an absolute professional maniac!
  “You see, only the 'good' can succeed against evil. You cannot beat evil when you yourselves have an army of evil, impure people. No, you see, that is why we are winning the war. Goo

1737

Rearrange a “Wife’s” affection!
When they dislocate my Brain!
Amputate my freckled *****!
Make me bearded like a man!

Blush, my spirit, in thy Fastness—
Blush, my unacknowledged clay—
Seven years of troth have taught thee
More than Wifehood every may!

Love that never leaped its socket—
Trust entrenched in narrow pain—
Constancy thro’ fire—awarded—
Anguish—bare of anodyne!

Burden—borne so far triumphant—
None suspect me of the crown,
For I wear the “Thorns” till Sunset—
Then—my Diadem put on.

Big my Secret but it’s bandaged—
It will never get away
Till the Day its Weary Keeper
Leads it through the Grave to thee.

I used to believe
that if I wore socks to bed
that they would cut off the circulation to feet
while I slept,
and I would have to amputate my feet off
when I woke up.

I still take my socks off before I go to sleep
because childhood fears make sense
in the darkness.

Twenty seven months of sunlight showers,
and I am still white –
can he pull me into vinegar?
Make my skin peel into another shade?

No one will recognize.
Our relationship is an oasis, not on a map
but I can spread like an ancient one –

used to being fingered and opened,
garden is a home of myriad wedding vows
when the wind gusts, he feels a promise
touching concealed cartilage

of his ear. No one has spoken so low and
has been heard by anyone even if
the feeling hangs like ferns from a rooftop.

And our body, our single form
hums in a similar silhouette with him above.
No one can amputate his seed from me:
I keep growing into last December

Assembly line broke down as the mirrors crashed and cracked.
"Angelina!!!" the crooked boss man yelled.
"Get in herre" the crook socks rang like bells.
Angelina poured sweat of the yellow blouse she had bought two days before for another interview in another office and another profession altogether. The room spun for her even though she would rather have it stay still.
"How much longer till this mechanism shifts and all of this stops altogether. Have their been madder women then me? Has there been madder men then me? Have their been madder times or are the times the same just with different tools and gears and nuts and bolts to tirelessly continue, heaving the corpses through the concrete cracked and littered streets?"
"Angelina!!!"
Another nail gun dropped to the floor, firing twenty rounds into fifty blue collared men's tie clips, deflecting them all to the near by wall which held the coats, the hats, the work shoes which the men were not allowed to wear due to "safety intrusions" and "labor union by lateral horizontal negative dairy laws". Another unfortunate fortune from the cracked mirror case but that, of course, is not the story, our story is...
"Angelina!!!"
Angy hurried up the hungry, empty metal n' holy stairs. She lost her high heels in a crack in the stairs but left them there due to the fear. 2011 had been a good year until she had been forced by her landlord, also her boyfriend, to get a real job rather then stuffing her knitted socks with her poetry and trying to haggle them to new age modern morons of the hip near sighters whom glasses were unintelligible but necessary. The mirrors of the conveyor belts reached the top of the platform but the door was shut. The mirrors bent and shattered leaving the splintered pattern of the world outside of them multiplied by the millions.
Noon was her lunch break and it was noon oh two. Angelina would be late with her lunch and the landlord, Nick, was planning to stop in with some home made sandwiches and home made potato chips.
"Nick will have to wait." Angelina thought to herself. "Nick hates to wait."
Angelina entered to stand in the wake of a shaking, sweating purse wearing, purse lipped boss boss. His hair was tossed to one side, struggling to hide his baldness. The subtelty of their relationship was difficult considering Angelina had slept with boss boss to get tossed this job. The act was actually enjoyable, Angelina thought him a good lay, but boss boss was not a fun person to be around, and he was a much worser boss.
"Angelina!!!"
"Hi."
"Your FIRED!"
"Bye then sir..."
"ANGELINA!!!"
"Yes sir?"
"AREN'T YOU GOING TO ASK WHY YOU WERE JUST SO HASTILY AND VIOLENTLY FIRED?"
"It is not my place to inquire why I was fired sir. If I was not doing my specific duty well enough I trust you, as my superior, to have thought what this subtraction would do to your company. If I had questioned you I would be questioning yourself as a boss and I would never want to do that...sir."
"VERY GOOD. DISMISSED!!!"

---

"So he just fired you, no explanation, nothing?"
"There was nothing really to say after the fact."
"You could have demanded an explanation."
"I was in a hurry to meet you. I know you hate to be late for our dates."
"That's sweet."
"And boss boss shouldn't have to explain himself, he IS a professional."
"He works in mirrors which doesn't make at all make him a ropes course supervisor."
"He's very handsome when He means what He says."
The home made potato chips had been burnt because Nick had fallen asleep while watching old re-runs of run marathons from the 80's. Nick had trained for the Olympics in 83' but while home after training and drinking an OK shake, Nick had stubbed his toe while drinking the OK shake and trying to get to a ringing telephone. Nick had collided so perfectly, so quickly and with such for that his right big toe had bent all the way back, his big toe fingernail touching the hairy patch on the top of his foot. The doctors said amputate the toe and save the foot or chop the entire thing off altogether. Nick, not being a dumb ****, opted for the entire foot. He never raced again.
"Are you going to try and get your job back?
"I don't know"
"Well. It's the 28th tomorrow and I need the rent either way. The insurance agency I'm with has been bugging me about percentages and utilities and...well, you don't want to hear about my worries."
"I don't mind sweety."
"Thanks doll. What're you gonna do?"
"Find more work I guess. I haven't written anything in a while, maybe it's a good time to get back on that train, see what comes up."
"I saw a help wanted sign at the mall nail salon."

---

Baby stroller wheels lined with pink and grey gum were lined up against the overwhelming glass wall enclosing the shops from the streets. Trees reflected green with the sun light lined across the clear wall. Birds flew at the top of the block near the ceiling crop, they wanted to come in but were confused how to do so. Children came through the valley with lollipops and balloon powder and strings lined with meats, they were headed to the capitalistic circus, a wonder land that only brought guilt from lovers and their future children's shame.
Angelina stood outside the electronic moment to moment receivers. She was afraid of not being allowed entry. Everyone entering entered easily, but what of she? Would she be accepted? Clicking her unpainted fingernail atop her leopard print clip purse and what was worse she had no cash to get her orange Julius or perhaps see a film if she couldn't conjure of the courage to stop off at the salon. That was why she had come here, right?
"Where had the salon been?" Angelina said aloud.
The mass of the mall was vibrating with a ferocious congruity. Through the fog of meaty torso's lay blank and content faces. Gripping their wares, their steaming quick food, some of it dropping to their foot only to be kicked around on the dirtied floor. At times a rat would scurry from underneath a traveling underwear salesmen to grab a piece of fried bread, half cooked meat, or small pieces of children's hair which floated softly down to the wet and mud streaked floor. Mall cops waved their sticks to each other, some kind of HAIL or CHEER that they were the one's in charge round' these parts and there wasn't nothing no one was going to do about it.
"Do I really want to work here?"
There was no choice though. Angelina needed to pay the rent or her landlord/boyfriend would kick her out on the street and from there, she had no clue where the blue sky would take her. Her parents, both dead thirteen years ago, would be a terrible place to set up camp, especially in a graveyard. Angelina's brother lived over seas working at a ***** clinic trying and failing to heal the weak and unwanted. He had tried to heal her through voodoo practices he gathered up drunk through his 6 month stay in New Orleans but it had only given her a bright blue and red rash for three to four weeks. She never longer trusted her brother with any kind of healing or "feel better" techniques and was no prepared to make the trek to Europe anytime soon, she was in a relationship at the moment anyway and she had a feeling she might be in love.
Angelina stepped through the glass exchanging doors in unison with a family that was entering at the same time. The door seemed to open for any body but was tentative if it would accept hers, this time, it seemed to.
Inside she made her way up "the miracle marbled stairs" which shined bright and blinded Angelina in certain parts of her eyes. They flashed bright red and greens and whites so visciously and fast Angelina thought she might have some kind of seizure. She planted her feet directly on each step as she walked up the 20 to 30 stairs, going very slow and gripping the handrail. People started to gather around behind her shouting "HURRY UP LADY" and "WE DON"T GOT ALL DAY" and giggling to themselves.
"Were they not seeing these lights?" Angelina thought to herself.
"Do you kind people know where the nail salon is?"
Angelina then realized that what she had just said made no sense. Her eyes were gripped shut, her hand tight around the shiny gold handrail, her feet pointed strictly out like some kind of paralyzed summer penguin. The people which had gathered behind her stood bare, jaw slacked, wondering who would step forth to help this poor helpless creature.
A little girl with red sparkled shoes and a orange bow atop her head stepped forth. She smiled even though she knew Angelina had her eyes tightly shut, maybe she would feel the warmth? The girl's mother reached for her so not to get to close to that "crazy lady" but the little girl pulled away, her father saying "If it's her time to go, it's her time to go".
"Miss lady with the tiger purse, I think the hardware nail pull on is on the 8th floor next to the people that sell bread with meat sticks inside."
The little girl stepped gingerly back as Angelina loosened her grip on the now stained golden handrail. She shook her hair out and ran her fingers through it, straightening herself up as if she were about to perform a song or late night poetry reading. Angelina opened her eyes and peered down at the girl.
"Thank you little girl. What's the best way to get there?"
The girl child said nothing. She pointed to a large metal box shooting up and down the length that looked like a rocket straight to heaven. People were gathered all around its foundation, oooing and ahhhing at the sight of the one's which entered. There was a sign over the line of tubes reading "A Shot at the Void".
"A shot at the Void..." Angelina tentaively breathed to herself.
Angelina stepped up the last couple glittering stairs and made her way through the thick crowd of stale clothes, cheap tricks, obsessed teeny boppers, hardware for wear, shoes with no laces, strips of bacon hanging from mouths, lettuce all shredded, soda cans with their lids torn clean off with small splatters of blood lined on the rim, and a perfectly painted fingernail was drawn on the number eight where the long lines and rows of numbers were there to guide the one's to the shot.
"Number eight. Easy enough"
Angelina pushed the button.

---

Inside the tube there was a slow light hum of jazz transfusion and children breathing. There were three little daughters gripping their mother's hands as they bit into their soda pop straws, ******* up the soda inside the plastic and cardboard cups. All three children stared up at her, maybe wondering what she was wondering, which was exactly what Angelina was wondering, a combination of mistaken telepathy, an accident of consciousness that would be never be talked about between the four of them but most surely existed between them.

Smooth as clay they drifted up the translucent clear glass tube, shooting skyward like a man made rocket shot from a man made gun. They passed shops hocking wears of angelic colors: clear pearl pastels shone through the clear blue glass shining into Angelina's eyes forcing Her to squint, dog barks could be heard through the whistling air begging for treats of black and brown, teriyaki chicken strips and duck heads spun absurdly fast with a rhythm that resembled the wave of a crowd at a baseball game waving wildly like children flying from swings never wanting to land in the sand; all this as the three and one flew higher and higher and higher.

---

Ding.

---

Angelina stepped forward, leaving the three children behind Her to fend for themselves. From the looks of the button they had pushed they were headed East. She gripped her bag and peeled Her eyes, twisted her hair in a tight knot to show her aggression, her vigor, her confidence and stepped into the rabid salmon like crowd.

She saw no signs of the nail salon. She saw only posters of rabbits holding artichoke legs and nail guns firing rockets of ice cream and corn bread. These were the mirrors of the supposed revolution but had nothing to do with her nail salon, she needed the cash and she needed it NOW! How hard were the numbers to acquire? How long must she wait before the envelope is sent and the letter read and thrown out? How long Lord, how long?

Questions for a time when the pay checks were easy coming and Her man was by her side. She passed by a little boy playing William Tell with her sister. An apple on the little tots head and in the boys a small, tight and silver ray gun. The boy pulled the trigger but only a small plume of smoke came from the top making the boy ball over crying and wailing and kicking and screaming, nearly catching Angelina in the shin, what a mess...The little girl stayed still in Her spot though because her brother told her "Now don't move a cinch." Wise move my girl, wise move...

At last! Angelina, reaching Her destination saw the brightly neon colored corner of her beloved Nail Salon. The windows shone with pure red glitter, miniatures of poodles lapping up puddles of ice water, women laying out on the sun to catch rays from the Earth, and husbands shaving their backs all in a circle and row.

"How beautiful..." Angelina breathed out.

She entered the store front. Greeted from every corner were beautiful young cupid like angels faces shining divine but with no torsos, floating heads of angels ***** but crying and smiling. Asking Angelina "What would you like today miss?" or "What are you after?", beckoning for her requests, begging for her touch of vulnerability and lack of knowledge of where she was or what she needed.

"Just an application...I heard you all were hiring?"

"Hiring!!!?" the cupid heads screamed in unison.

"You want to become one of us?"

"Yes, part-time...?" Angelina said hesitantly.

As soon as the words "part" had been uttered from Angelina's wise and brave mouth the many heads of cupid began spinning and spinning around Angelina's body. Faster and faster they spun until Angelina herself was spinning with them, unified in a quadruple hurricane stripping her of her former self and slowly manipulating her body, her hair, her other self into her new self.

As Angelina's torso lay in the corner of the store un-bloodied, clothes tattered as well as some scratches  on her elbows from the toss, Angelina's head was floating in the perfect center of the other three hovering cupid heads.

"How beautiful...how beautiful...how beautiful."

"Isn't it?" the three cupid heads answered.

"Yes, everything here is so beautiful," the four of them whispered.

And as soon as Angelina had entered, she just as soon had left.

END

Bright buds hang precarious on their limbs. Their hundreds of digits green and supple sway as the winds try gently at first to shake them from their perches. They snap back, their ties elastic, always bending.

The wind struck harder the third time. It caught them off guard, swinging back to face the sun. It barreled over them like a train, limbs snapped like bones under tons of industrial revolutionary steel, the cracking brings tears to the eyes of passersby.

They were so green, so verdant was their exuberant friendship, covered in rosy flesh and sturdy bark, ring after ring of tribulation and triumph, but it fractured like a wish bone. She, Persephone, prosecutor of Her, Demeter, was judge of them both, prisoner of herself.

Solitary confinement.

She tugged at her half, she needed the wish, She need for Demeter to see that She needed wishes just like the rest of us.

Demeter, jury. 12.

Her crime: attempted impartiality, balancing a utilitarian ideal that we can divide our attention based on who needs it most. She cannot be tried on account of her inability to read Braille ciphers in gestures, ****** expressions, and Tumblr posts.

Demeter tugged at her half, but only enough to show the other that she was there,
but consistently there.

It wasn’t enough.

Snap.

No marrow could be found.

Where flesh was meant to be dripped rot, an odor of resentment filled their nostrils, it choked Demeter, as Persephone had been choking for years.

This resentment, this cancer, this jealousy, it grew inside of Persephone like a tumor, days from metastasizing, the spread could have killed them.

Amputate.

You two are a tree. Bright buds dangling from every limb, they are still soft and green and supple at their ends.

You two are still growing.

Persephone will cut out this cancer, and She will heal herself, scar tissues covered by broadleafs.
You will soothe them for her. And you will see past the rosy flesh what pain it may hide.

And you two will grow. Roots firm, faces braced against the wind, and limbs always turned towards the sun.

Sugar level on high
Cronenberged my body
I’m so sorry my little frail body
I betrayed you like the *** I don’t get
Pretty soon I’ll fix you back with levels in tact
No more on your *** and you better work it fast
Feet tingling and sleepy every time
Didn’t mean to get sick
I got enough time to get better
Farewell youthful age into changing leafs
it’s a way for  growing old
I fell against pastel spilling colors and it took me out of my grey zone
Don’t let my face amputate so forget it
I’ll be cured
sugar level are you high?
taking in so much insulin
glucose isn’t good for toast
I don’t want to get needles in my behind
rather get myself tapped with hands

They were happy
For the first time in their lives
A window of joy
An instance of hope
She was so beautiful
A baby girl
But happiness is a kind of sorrow in itself
Nothing in life is free
The mother was bleeding
Her life slowly ebbing away,
slipping through her fingers
she paid for her daughter’s life
with her own
they could have saved her
she could have raised her child
but there was no blood

He had lived this far
only by a miracle
all those years of chemotherapy
slowly decaying his body
his spirit, willing
his flesh, so weak
since birth
his own body killing itself
leaukimia had taken its toll
they said he had lived too long
that he was a fighter
eight years old
but he needed the transfusion
to live eight more
he could have lived longer
he could have had
his first date
his first dance
his first kiss
he could have walked down the aisle
with the love of his life
he could have known life, love and happiness
before he knew death
he could have known the joy of bringing up his children
of watching his grand children grow
but now he can’t
he sits in a hospital bed , surrounded by those who love him
awaiting his fate
for there was no blood

an unborn baby
getting ready to enter this world
this beautiful world
not knowing how much
sorrow his coming brings
his mother sheds tears
though not of joy
it was either him or her
a mother forced to decide
the life of her child
or that of herself
but there was a slim chance
he could survive
they had to operate
she agreed.
The operation
A success
The baby was saved
....well almost saved
they tried every corner
looking, searching
hospitals, dispensaries
they even appealed to schools
but they got the same answer
his whole life ahead of him
now lay behind him
he was six months old
prematurely born
pre maturely dying
he could have lived
but there was no blood

They were to wed in two weeks
Exchange vows
Walk down the aisle
Sound familiar
But war came up
He went to fight for his country
To keep her safe
She remained
Praying each day for his return
Then they brought back his body
Mortar fire, shrapnel
had shredded his flesh beyond hope
They had to amputate his leg
He bled to death
They could have saved him
She walks down the aisle
But as a widow not a bride
A dirge instead of the wedding march
Haunts her steps
She carries lilies instead of roses
Black-clad instead of white.
The brightes of days turned to
a night as dark as midnight’s face
the vows she would have said
had been fulfiled
till death did them part.
He could have been by her side
Kissing her
Watching as she threw the bouqet
Watching as their first child learned to walk, ride a bicycle
As their first child got married
They could have sp[ent the rest of their lives
Together as they ought to have been
But there was no blood

We preach water and drink wine
we excpect to be saved
when we refuse to save others
we take on the role of executioner
executioner of the innocent
i’m afraid, it will hurt, i don’t have enough
i can’t do it, i’m too old
We **** the innocent with our decision
We **** our future, our hope, our dreams
We **** those we love

You say none of these apply to you
Then Let me dash your dream world
Your fantasy, your bubble that you call life
Let me dash them on the jagged teeth of reality

Your brother lies dying in an ambulance
A knife sticking out of his heart
He has been mugged
Your father lies, dying, after a heart bypass operation
His only chance of life becoming one of the many for death.
Your mother lies sick in a hospital bed
Anaemic and slowly slipping away
Age caught up with  her
Your sister lies in a clinic
An accident cut a major blood vessel
She is losing her life
You could have saved them all
But you didn’t
Maybe you still  can
Or maybe its too late
Did i forget to mention
You lie in the bed next to your mother
Wishing, hoping, praying for life
Weak from a car crash
You have lost the very blood you refused to give
The very blood you wish could save the lives of your loved ones
The doctor walks in
Clip board in hand.
What do you think he will say.

What will your ending be.
You may
Choose your destiny
Or choose your death
But remember,
Greater love hath no man
Than to lay down his life for a friend
How much more if it were a stranger.

one person said: "peace is nothing but illusion
all I want is retribution"
[from "Pure Power" by Zardonic]
that's something I can identify with, which is why
I decided to write this heap of lines
————————————————————————————————
on a shooting range in a boondock la[ɛ]nd
with gloves pU̲t on; sta[ɛ]nd
in front of an autocratic ruler chained
by his hands to two moola safes'
[greed]
handles looking way
like an old-fangled car directing wheel
[steering wheel]
have this die-hard fool restrained
so that he, more or less, is still
I'm not a scho[ɑ]lar who can wave
around a degree in the medics field
but it's obvi this high-hat dO̲U̲chebag's plagued
with megalomania in a neglected condition
but there's a dreadfully effectual treatment
and he'll get it like villains
quite a gruesome fate
is looming upon this power-befuddled ****
like darkened clouds that, beyo[ɑ]nd a doubt, are soon to rain
["dark end"]
like waveriders, he's go[ʌ]nna serve
["surf"]
as a punchbag for I'm in quite a mood to raze
gonna wI̲nd up as nada short
of a ****** loon today
like Battinson, clepe me Vengeance
but I'm more something like the Zorro-looking caped
anti-autocratic vigila[ɛ]nte
from the Norsefire-ruled UK
[V from "V For Vendetta"]
meets someone whose work field's tormenting
like victimizers who pertain
to LE in one tsar-sized off-putting state
[law enforcement]
you know, the one that's go[ɑ]t a putrid trait
of always posing as a side you shouldn't blame (it's all the West!)
(now, let's go back to the foul autocrat)
like a jerky boss that you disdain
I give this no[ɑ]b a cool g'day
by douching him from a bo[ɑ]ttle full of straight-
-fro[ʌ]m-a-cooler H2O; just a fE̲w secs break
for him, & once it's U̲p, I ****** this base
being fro[ʌ]m a stE̲wpot great
with **[ɑ]t-a## noodles aimed
into this hU̲mbug's stupid face
[the "hang noodles on the ears" expression]
pepper it with some ground 7-po[ɑ]t to boost the taste
feel how I, like a husband who betrayed
his devoted, yet testy, wife, get rudely gazed
at, racked, beda[ɛ]mned (by who?)
by food-lacking men from Africla[ɛ]nd
[Africa]
ask him: "is the provided food okay?"
zero gratitU̲de displayed
all that comes from this sno[ɑ]t's bazoo's complaint
but nO̲[ɑ]t that I'm surprised
a typical pro[ɑ]sperous gobshite
the tack priorly applied
I do the same with a bucket full of maroonish paint
[autocrats have blood on their hands, hence "maroonish paint"]
like that music producer famed for dull future bass
I put on his viscous head a **** bucket
[Marshmello]
whereafter pick a wedge up & drum it
[golf wedge]
and, like a heap, I barely get started
[worn-out car]
like an unprepped passenger on an insane car ride
with no seat restraints applied
he's about to have a way hard time
I'm a cosmetic surgeon that operates part-time
fix his blamed jawline in just twain sharp swipes
with a steel bat, then yield some keen slaps
that meet his kneecaps until the knees snap
like the Baba Yaga hitman detached
from his peaceful life by someone ge[ɪ]tting him mad
[John Wick]
get his nails removed
which is pretty much the same that you do
when you repaper a room
[wall nails]
having perforated his fingertips
I ge[ɪ]t 'em plastered
a few minutes later, I rip them things
off 'kin/sim. to wax strips
he gets his phA̲[eɪ]lanxes smitten with
a freaking ratchet
[rathet wrench]
pro[ɑ]b'ly, he regrets
that his bo[ɑ]dy's still not dead
pick U̲p a pistol, set
a drum-like clip in, get
it cocked, then shoot lead around his silhouette
till the clip has zero ammunition left
seems like this once co[ɑ]cky piece of dreck
has gotten his khaki chinos wet
but if I've go[ɑ]t him in a sweat
like a summer jo[ɑ]gger being dressed
in venthole-deficient threads
for this brash dude, there's bad news
like me when I write some sick bloodshed
sadly for him, I've not finished yet (uh-uh)
like a runner that's go[ɑ]t some distance left
to complete, & it's not as dark as things can get
'cause, like the heroine o[ʌ]f M. Streep in "Death
Becomes Her" after falling fro[ʌ]m that string of steps
I've got a somewhat twisted head
[Madeline Ashton; the staircase fall scene]
so consider this as an insult-to-inju[—]ry sesh
grab a brace of scissors
for garden mainte[—]nance; Richard
Trager comes into play; begin ta
amputate his fingers; operate at leisure
disarticulate 'em I̲nto twenty eight **** pieces
cauterizing the remains with illuminated cI̲gars
fling into his piggish face some tissues
and some pain relievers
tell this nazissistic patient "hE̲A̲l up"
["****" in the sense of being "severely intolerant or dictatorial"]
let him relax for eighteen minutes
over the spa[ɛ]n of whI̲ch I put on play "La Chica
Rockabilly" & some other ro[ɑ]ckabilly
jams to make the whole vibe a mite less grisly
like an NA brown bear that is gravely injured
["mightless grizzly"; North American]
(as, in fact, this tragic-fated bleeder)
whereafter spray him with a
["wither"]
can of gas & make his dicta—
—torial a## go ablaze akin ta
a straw-fabricated figure
during gala days at the late of winter
[Maslenitsa effigy]
telling this piece of trash "in case you wI̲[ɪ]nd up
in somewhat of Hades, give a
warm shalom to the infamous ******"
consider this autocratic ****
a sugar daddy's skirt
'cause he's gotten what he was asking for
————————————————————————————————
oh, & one thing more to say: the
nullified, like ruler's presiding terms, dictator
was known among some as "toilet sprayer"
like a scuttered urinator

"shop closed"
the sign never sat
perfectly on any hook
or nook
or cranny
you are an echo bounced
perfectly in every hook
and nook
and crook

"considered sold once broken"
consider it done
once dealt with the devil
his ornamental fairies
consider them whole before
they were bought

"trespassers will be prosecuted"
bedsheets spun out of cobwebs
sandcastles spun in of air
floorboards swallow you in
you dreamt of
anchoring yourself
to the ground

"wine house"
lustre of turbulent pirouttes
trapped within the walls
of wine glasses and
wine-stained dresses
in cadavers' masquerade

"emergency only"
they pushed you in the operating theatre
and cleaned their hands with soap
opera
amputate these phantom limbs
pain has been the only anaesthesia

"in loving memory of"
he is the protagonist
he is the antagonist
and all stories end*
(with)              
                     the former

If you remove darkness inside me how much matter would remain?
Would it be a clean break or would that shadow leave a stain?
The antiques passed through generations only weigh me down
Heirloom weakness and shame parents wore as crowns
Would bring all the way till I crossed the finish line
Their weight is making progress steadily decline
Yet when I try releasing find their grip is way too strong
Have no other choice but drag these heavy burdens along
I fear limbs decay the more time that passes by
Friction wearing holes in flesh
I can't sever ties
A broken soiled reputation all I've seemed to gain
Blessings one by one like drops of water swirled the drain
Under layers of appearance is a piece of myself I rightly hate
Seems to be too large to safely amputate
These cheap thrills have gotten more expensive than platinum and gold
Their toll taken by draining my peace and prematurely making me old
As I held dreams in hand I stumbled and I fell
Shattered as they hit the floor
Hopes more fragile than eggshells
Then clumsy feet only made the mess worse
Every step makes a crunching noise
Wish I could somehow reverse
I never knew growing up would cause me to feel so low
Only when flying too high that I see how far the pavement waits below
The little girl in me died now there's a stranger in her place
Look in mirror and am terrified because the stranger wears my face

Long before Horus' exposure on its trunk
and the nailing of Jesus upon its grain,
rings have been added within the Tree
while people proclaim to hold the key
of salvation: a continually borrowed mythology
swallowed; an extra-strength sleeping pill

pulling the masses into slumber,
and away from the awakened truth
that such supposed salvation
is an illusory ticket far too easy to obtain
for it to be real—
a discriminatory, fairy tale-damnation
that multiplies the divide
of "Us and Them."

Too many people hand out the easy tickets,
then cut and light the tree:
a hypodermic injection of selfish memories
mixed into the mortar of temples designated as sacred,
while dogmatic shears amputate roots from the sky.

Too many people preach
about a cheap, polystyrene heaven,
while only a few walk the narrow path
that leads towards the kingdom within,
and live the sacrifice because it feels right.

Again and again,
the ticket isn't so easy.
We must put aside our slumber-crutches,
stop watching the few carry the rest
upon their backs, until bones creak and groan
from the weight of people waiting for salvation
to be handed to them.

For 27 years, 46664 was etched into the bark
of a branch in the road.
When forked doors opened,
a living, breathing gospel
brought down fences,
and even then, the wood was made into crutches
for people to say,
"M will fix it; M will do this, M will do that;
M will save us, just wait and see."

M is finally free. Yes, he is free!
Free, but not lost to us;
he survives as spirit-seeds.

We must cease to lean upon crutches;
we must purge the pill from our blood
and awaken into gardeners who water the seeds
within the soil of our hearts,
before the vision withers completely,

and we remain only as husks
waiting to be hydrated by watering cans—
weakened hands and arms unable to lift their weight

held in our own hands all along,
held in our hands all along.

The moon shone full that fatal night
When Stonewall and his men
were returning from a scout
around their former friends.
The brightness of the risen moon
Put them in silhouette.
The pickets rose and fired;
an action they would soon regret.
Stonewall Jackson was unhorsed,
a Minnie ball in his arm.
The surgeons had to amputate.
One week later he was gone.
It marred a famous victory,
A masterpiece of Lee’s,
when Jackson crossed over the river
to rest in the shade of the trees.

Girls have beautiful legs and men have beautiful hearts,
both I love to squeeze, both I love to open
hide my gold locket inside like a ticking bomb:
I use the chain to lasso arteries and muscles for me to chew on
but the necklace unbolts for a souvenir collected inside.

It could be the curly hair of his shin, one wisp from her neck
I previously tugged on with my teeth. I performed
open-heart surgery on a man and open-leg surgery on a woman
both called me back to say a second goodbye
and I wonder, I wonder which farewell will be the final.

When will the mementos be massacred
glued to a comatose form, deceased into an emotionless resin?
I could amputate their limbs and turn off the pacemaker.

"plan a" was to be cordial:
you said, "coexist."
we toasted with our cappuccinos,
"to coexisting," before replacing our masks.
smile. wave. be polite.
I suppose some dozen missteps by me rendered this plan
useless.

"plan b" is much harder.
put your hand on the table.
the knife comes down, quick,
press the hot metal to the wound.

amputate. cauterize.
use your friends as a tourniquet,
like the one I've been twisting you into for the last year
and a half.

You rent out my hand
and abduct my mouth
to force me to speak
I will oppose
You intoxicate my legs
and hide away my feet
while returning my debt
and ***** me
just so I may speak
I oppose
You embrace me in a tea room
send me grape juice
and give me a sentence
only for me to speak
I am opposing
You amputate my brain
so I may admit to my thought
And play me a tape which is outgoing
So I might decide to say
of my needles
and say so speaking
I still oppose

here's the price for playin with fire
I'm the dealer you're the buyer

one way ticket to hell
i sense your eagerness, i know it well

STOPPIN FOR PASSENGERS

get some rush thru your vein
here i am to step up the game

okay sit back relax
check your arms .. their full of tracks

moving on to your femoral vein
a 5 mill needle gonna rush your brain

watch out for the DVT
the NHS amputate for free

sit back and enjoy the ride
you're about to lose all your pride

you just handed it to me
i ain't finished yet ... you will see

here i am to make you hurt
as I grind your life into the dirt

(C) MANDY RIGBY 23.06.214

I have no solid idea of where I stand in regards to the social bonds I've thus far formed. No conclusion I draw is indefinitely backed up and the more I think about the inconsistencies of my observations of others versus their actions thereafter, the more I am frustrated and pushed to understand and predict them. There is an invading paranoia swelling in my skull; I fear I am being lied to, and I harbor very little doubt that this is so. Disheartened, there is not much left to do besides either amputate these slippery bonds or perform surgery on the minds of others, coaxing the literal unbias I so crave from their auditory masks.
Do not **** with me, you machinations of society, my fuse it short.
What a puzzle, what a fruitless aim. I've been removed for such a time that I'm unsure whether these cogs deserve motion, or even feel righteous in their rotation. I deserve but one of three outcomes. That I might see the actual grinding and spark, that I might unbind the ties of this machine to my being, or that I might find some hopeless madness to consume my concern.

She doesn't aim to ****
She rather puncture, amputate, deform
She's never done spinning her web
Even when you're paralyzed

She magnifies her lies
And calls it transformation
Convincing others you're a burden
Who needs to be put out of her misery

She doesn't believe in raising the dead
But she's an expert in lowering the living
The sudden best friend who keeps her enemies closer-
(An angel with no motives is a demon in disguise)

She's dancing and singing in my opera of horror
She's happy to play the part
She's waiting for my lavish palace of wonder
To turn into a grotesque carnival of mirrors

As underneath those China eyes and pirate smile
Hides a latrodectus blackbird-
Leaving her venom and ******* your essence
So she can fly

So don't be fooled by the lack of red-
She keeps the hourglass in her head
She's in the business of changing names
Passing to you the hysterics of Jane
(Claire, I can't find you in there)

Thriving on your denial
Creative only in deception
She'll put your footprints on a devil's pact
And call it her reception

True as any fallen black wing
She only shows herself in shadows
The little, rogue, blood-thirsty fiend
Loves to get her hands ***** in private

But while she drinks from the cup of others' sorrows
Thinking she has lightning in a bottle
She may forget that one of these tomorrows
Her beloved beast will turn on her

Living in her kingdom of jewels
She would've gotten away unscathed
Pity, the infrastructure wasn't infused
With wisdom-
The charmer of limbs will fall

(Silly girl,
Robots aren't sacred)

Amputation (the final word)

Who thought…?  Who knew?
Now it’s you
And fingers gone
To amputation.

You’ve seen programs. Said, “How brave!”
Thought about limbs saved and strengthened.  
Training every second hour,
Power growing,
Phantom aches and pains still gnawing:
They’re a marvel!

Now you know!
For that’s the way the cookie crumbles,
And it humbles one, for sure.
There’s no cure for amputation.
Something gone is gone.

The answer is to go on
Taking pleasure, having fun,
Taking sun and making merry ‘fore the sun goes down,
The gone-ness mostly in the brain.

Strong and proud:
Join the crowd!

Amputation 6.6.2020 Pure Nakedness II; Circling Round Experience; Arlene Nover Corwin

Amputate; To cut off (a limb) by surgical operation.
Origin: mid 16th century: from Latin amputat- ‘lopped off’, from amputare, from am- (for amb- ‘about’) + putare ‘to prune’.

Note: “Amputation” was aimed at anyone who is amputated and happens to read it.  It’s not aimed at the world.  I saw this impressive  documentary about a group of men and women sorely handicapped in one other way, taking a group trip to and through Vietnam, and was so moved I just had to write something.
They went through rivers, caves, highways, narrow wooden bridges, taking turns at driving, some never having driven,  trusting one another, exhorting one another...
That’s what inspired this poem.

She fell and broke her life
People rushed to help
It was touch and go for a time
The surgeon had to amputate
But he was finally removed
The recovery was long
Sometimes she felt he was still there
Touching her inside
Messing with her head
They said this would happen
Such intensity is bound to leave scars
But they would heal
Someday another would come along
She would be stronger.

Why do they seem to portray a four-legged beast
Breathing misery in every soul
Stuck in this very cruel moment
Scribbling a thousand of letters I will never send

Scars open...
Jinx minded delusion running every inch of my muscles
The depth can never be touch
Its motion can never be felt

Scars?
Scars like hungry blades
Threatening to amputate
My essence of being
Into finer meat crumbs

Air glasses raised
In celebration of injustice commanded
That hinders those like me
Who are the victims
From our unfolded freedom

I'm slowly dying a sweet death
Like of salty, ravenous sea
Hell no!
Its not what I didn't know
Its what I didn't say
Its not what I didn't feel
Its what I didn't show

Scars?
Open like deep oceans of bloodily tears
Galloping like a race horse
My wrist rippled with deliberate carelessness
My mind running through two diverged road to the unknown

Amputate
His leg
She said so calmly
I thought
Yours first

I wish I could navigate the minefield of my mind
Its corners dark and undefined.
One step too far, it all explodes
It explodes, my being erodes.
I walk through slowly with a hopeful face
Behind me, anxiety soon gives chase.

Anxiety stabs me, sanity's scorcher
And as I weep, I'm ****** to self torture.
Cut in the heart by worries future to past
I'm paralyzed to think this day is my last.
I break the mirror, shouting at my appearance
Meandering in camouflage is my only clearance.

I'm comforted by brief moments of peace
But it's back to the minefield as those cease.
I sit and smile as I amputate
In this personal hell I create.
And I shudder to think of an eternity bound
To this forsaken battleground.

scared to touch
these feelings
so I'll just watch them
float away
like a bubble
wonder about life
being alone
so used to it
but so uncomfortable
pity the mirror that reflects me
who wants to be scared
who wants to be alone
who makes the choice I made
to amputate your own heart
sometimes I still play make believe
except this time
my bed is a casket
not a pirate ship
and I won't have to get up
tomorrow morning
and face the same day
that was faced yesterday
and today
I'm worn to my bones
my bones worn to marrow
cannot stand anymore
so just sit on the floor
weak
weeping quietly
should I drink or should I ****
I hide both from the ones I love
until the feelings disappear
and let in the jealousy
that they get to float away
while I stay grounded
too scared to
let it all go

Tears eroding my love for you,
Too many rivers I've cried for you,
I wish I'd never kissed you,
I wish you'd never held me,
I'll be fine again
right after I demolish your face,
You were never going to lead me
to a bright place.

You, you only messed with my head,
brought my love back from the dead,
made promises you couldn't keep,
never said goodnight,
let me drift alone to sleep
and living in your silence
has told me all I needed to know;
all the words you haven't said
have shown me exactly what you meant.

I can't amputate my
disappointment forever,
I can't keep burying my face
for your name's sake,
now my pain will leak in ink,
and don't dare ask if I'm still yours,
because my answer will be
a slammed door.

FROM THE FLAGSTONES 
 
This concrete town with no guts,
no grit where we can only smirk
as galoshered feet slip ‘n’
slide in and out our café where
exhalations of icy conversations
mix with the fog and cigarette smoke.
 
It’s a damp riverbank town
border with riptides
sneak currents
no watchtowers no walls
an escape for the committed
or reckless – the next country
a lucky swim away.
 
You draw down
panelaks, teetering like headstones
(that lost their plots
a regime ago)
pen in flagstones and millstones
flower tubs filled
with butts and dead dogs
tarted up with cans and stencils
subjects of your studies in pencil.
 
Nature’s only concession
(so far as I can see)
is this wedge like a warm slice of pizza -
four fall trees jutting out of the bar
where dogs curl up in corners
and mist pushes in fishermen
selling trout -
 the toxic confetti
swirling around the passing
procession of Saturday weddings
dragging monochrome trains
drawn into this twilight
fugue whisked by an accordian player,
guests laughing back at us
while you’re smirking back at them
cocooned in wine and tuica
almost  lost in your sketch
smudging *** ash for sky
dreamy with relaxed fatigue
of travel and infatuation.
 
Your pad’s our field dressing
that could work for a while
before the gangrene sets back in
so I’d like to amputate this souvenir wedge
for my scraps book.
 
I watch you listening out for the shanty
from the flagstones – about weeds
delicate, green, undamaged,
muscling through the cracks
in the concrete
drawn up to the cut where
we also look effortless and a little green.
 
Tomorrow we head for the border
and only one of us can swim.

the doctors dithered for days
whether to amputate the patient’s leg
it was a bone of contention

I belong to the State,
to these nurses who force milk soaked bread into my mouth

to these slaves who stuff trains
with beaten bodies, on to doctors who amputate without anaesthetic

to hard labour and hunger.

my blonde haired mother carried me
in her ayrian womb

Illegitimate.

some are kidnapped, blue eyes
running with tears as they

grab (carefully)

I am banging, bending, breaking
under the weight of their promise that

I am special

and I am proving my right to exist

to be spared
sterilisation, extermination ,
to not be a genetic undesirable
a gas chamber child

no, I am free
to sleep, to eat,
to breathe

allowed to live
because I am a
Lebensborn child