"sanctums" poems
Ghost Relics
Downtown,
where Main intersects Main
you'll see the last living tissue
of a breathing bazaar.
They weighed down her chest with bricks and girders.
It's a wonder she breathes at all.
-
Wander too far in any direction
and you're sure to see the husks
of once proud and bustling businesses.
Abandoned sanctums of mortar and majesty.
Scars of the Midwest etched as constants in our mind.
Dusty and silent since the cradle.
-
The theaters are bedeviled with dolled up haunts
who just wandered over from Greenwood to catch the matinee.
Management still leaves the lights on for kicks after hours
to throw off their sleep schedules while they wait for the feature to start.
Up all night, sleep all day; they read by neon and slumber under Sol.
Here I am, left lounging in The Devil's Chair. Crickets keep quavering.
-
Underneath the Franklin Street overpass sleeps a family bound by naught.
They watch in dawn's light as the few pedestrian that traverse Cerro Gordo
advert their eyes as some sort of silent symbol of respect for their situation.
It's as if the very stare of a privileged man could drain 'til depleted.
They never ask for anything, they just wade it out and listen to
the cars overhead, the train-clock's trumpet, and the heartbeats in between.
-
Leaks are patched, potholes filled, and yet
we're still loosing blood; becoming beguiled.
So many stray cats in the civilian savanna,
aimlessly seeking names and second chances.
"This premises is under police video surveillance" -
hanging like ornaments from streetlamp poles.
-
Guarding the gates
of a dwindling dominion,
as the armies of Union and Grand
wait in their camps
for the rust to take hold
of her iron veins.
Jun 14, 2014
Jun 14, 2014 at 12:52 AM UTC
London is an onion.
Not one of those big, brown juicy globes
you can buy in packs of three, from Tesco,
No, an earthy, shrivelled relic from an old geezer's allotment,
With trailing fronds and a few infestations.
If you were to take a bite, your eyes would smart and your body rebel with a cough, a shudder and a wheeze,
But moments later, a smile would be playing round your lips,
Such a sensory adventure, though not exactly pleasant, can still be savoured,
And you'll remember the taste forever.
Londoners are weevils, hiding in the layers.
Outer, inner, some of us worm our way between them all.
Me, I tend to head for the heart of the thing,
Soho, Southwark, the inner sanctums.
I sometimes venture nearer the surface, the outer edges,
But too close to the unknown, and unfamiliar air,
And I start to pine for the centre.
You can work between the layers,
But the many skins are tougher than you'd think,
Better to burrow down, find a place to sustain
The appetite of a hungry little grub.
Sep 15, 2013
Sep 15, 2013 at 3:01 PM UTC
faked botulism
and Beulah reds
Abyssinian horses
purportedly dead
all night blindness
that 'gravel' soothes
hovering indentions
southwestern barceuse
luminaries marked
tiny infantries swell
conically formed
so steady with shell
dihedral burns
for unlucky hands
swaying cognition
oh, little demands
sanctums ******
the sputum reigns
tenderness denied
a proper grave
you were ferried
holstered soul
lift your head
and let it go
Sep 28, 2011
Sep 28, 2011 at 5:20 AM UTC
Red-stained fingers match the
Taste of rust.
I wipe my mouth again.
The fire rises in my cheekbones
And descends upon my throat;
Lower sanctums, beware—
Forehead ripple lava pits,
Eyes like San Andreas.
The only way out is through
Sky blue inundation.
I drink.
Matron jar, round
And cool to the
Touch
Dripping life
From her hands
To mine.
Embers dwindle.
One last cough to push the
Smoke from my breath—
My ribs are paper bag empty.
Jun 1, 2011
Jun 1, 2011 at 11:19 PM UTC
*With Wings Of Mayhem Covered In September Dew,
She Flies Under The Autumn Sun On An Holiday Overdue,
Through Holographic Designs & Trumpeting Ecstasy,
She Transmutes Her Photographic Lusts Into Riveting Intimacy,
Lightning Visions In Her Empyrean Eyes,
Dreamscaping She Drifts Through Ethereal Skies,
Of Toxic Sanctums & Pulsating Screams,
She Titillates The Trance Up In Her ****** Schemes,
Myriad Stories Of Her Sonnets Divine,
Constructing Fluidic Reveries In Her Comic Design,
Like Chemical Dispersals Veiled In Her Digital Stains,
She Formulates Aphrodisiacal Elixir In Her Lyrical Rain,
Through Dimensional Shifts Of The Fractal Waves,
Her Cosmic Prophecies Actualize Into Sacramental Raves,
A Genomic Felony Concealed Inside Her Superficial Caves,
With Acoustic Muteness In Her Green Shaded Eyes,
As She Gleams Through The Millennial Skies,
In Melodious Echoes, She Whispers Of Arcane Lies.
- 05:28 AM*
May 30, 2017
May 30, 2017 at 8:18 PM UTC
**There is breath in sweet darkness,
sanctums beyond twilight and madness
where the shining of reality escapes,
naught discernible sensibilities
nor reasoning of spun agenda's logic
amidst pale incognito moonlight,
whilst tangible perceptions wait for the
shocking awe of a glaring dawn**
Jun 7, 2015
Jun 7, 2015 at 6:48 AM UTC
Omissions we make take us somewhere
but where that could be
I've no
clue,
I lose all momentum when friends come to stay
and the talk turns to
what shall we do
tomorrow.
Like
decaying uranium we linger, the fingers of time are our fate,
the half-lives of sinners are longer and get longer the longer they play on my nerves,
inner sanctums are no more a sanctuary
the walls I concreted broke down,
the lions may roar a denial, but something's
going on in the town,
ships sailing at dawn for the Islands
on missions to take them away,
only here for a day gone in sorrow,
in tears on the quayside
I see my
tomorrow.
The future is closer this evening
the day drifts off into the past,
uncertainty is the new reason
I'm glad that's
decided, at
last when the bell starts its long climb
before it falls back down
and chimes
I climbed that tall mountain
so often
and fallen back down
many times.
Oct 17, 2015
Oct 17, 2015 at 5:38 PM UTC
They gather in their thousands
to pray to a dead forgotten God
there is no hope for them, no heaven
when they die they will just be dead
Pity the blind, if you can be bothered
no angles to make them hover
listen to them sing the lie
all will die and never fly
Sunday Sanctum Sunday Sanctums
reading the book of wind and ****
they wait for their Bible to flood
with the sacrifice of Christ's blood
By Christos Andreas Kourtis aka NeonSolaris
Nov 26, 2013
Nov 26, 2013 at 3:46 PM UTC
Stuck in the wilderness, among the sanctums of green and indigo grandeur
Romulus and Remus are writing along their wills, shaking hands with the forest spirits as they pass by on the thorn covered roads
Crowns of silver being woven by the wrens in the willows, transmuting their echoes to blistered esteems
Among these wrecked ships, that naval graveyard whispering ink patches to sandpaper cathedrals
These things set in, among green woods with creatures looking on, as the sun sets upon the world
May 10, 2015
May 10, 2015 at 5:24 PM UTC
It begins with
a melodious blur
as a taste of forgetfulness slithers
over my humble skin.
A yearning evolves slowly,
to disappear away
from this meaningless pursuit of flesh,
we are trapped by our existence
and nothing else.
I trespass within myself,
in search of a purpose,
in the hidden sanctums of my delusion,
where blues waves greet my feet,
and the sky made of ice
howls with terrible winds, at my timidity.
It never rains,
But I always forget to stride aimlessly,
these hungry eyes are served
with sumptuous visions,
and till my hands bleed
this hallucination copulates
with my reality.
I finally learn to float
within myself.
I pen all of it down,
in the night
and call them as Art
in the morning.
May 8, 2018
May 8, 2018 at 2:14 AM UTC
Deep in my subconscious live puppet masters pulling strings on my lifeline as if we are build with a data-log
Consciously inventing evil dominions and armadas of plague, death & destruction
Hellbent Devils instructed to command and destroy the HUMAN RACE...
Putrid Sanctums; Mega-diabolical Instruments of Death & Doom
Slowly feeding on the ENLIGHTENED ONES & HOLY ONES
Heavenly Armada my D0MINI0N shall overtake the EARTH by Surprise and you all will NOT SEE IT COME...I shall come like a thief in the night to steal all the STARS and ALL the Planets at ONCE... FROM THE MOUTH OF THE LORD HAS SPOKEN!!!
Be prepared Oh Little creatures my Creations for from DUST YOU WHERE CREATED AND TO DUST U SHALL RETURN...sayest, the LORD. Amen
Apr 8, 2019
Apr 8, 2019 at 3:33 PM UTC
you are lying on your back in a bed 5,487 miles away from home.
there are geckos trilling from the corridors and the trees cast shadows in the room
above the door, the air con whirs and you shift, sticky, skin sweating against starched cotton sheets
too hot, too humid, too much
everything is too much, but at least it’s too much here instead of too much back there;
you visit temples, vast and golden in their glory, and white and intricate in their purity; ocher where the sun has kissed blessings upon their pillars,
and pretend that you too are subjected to the numinous nature of sanctums and their spirits
and pray they don’t notice that the awe in their eyes isn’t reflected in yours,
hope they don’t sense that you are not here to heal, only to stretch old wounds into splitting open anew
you are ruining your life
you are ruining your life somewhere beautiful that’s been the making of so many others’ lives
but you always strived to be different, never recognising
that agony, despair, self-deprecation, self-victimisation, suffering—they’re the most common connecting factors between all humans
you are the same as the other six billion people aching and crying and spitting anger in their sorrow,
blind to the one billion ***** trying to make the world a better place so the rest of you might smile a little more often.
one of the geckos scurries across the ceiling and you flinch,
a moment of fear for the unknown before you settle once more and simply watch his little legs fidget his body to freedom through the slats of your propped open window.
inside your chest there’s a moment of heavy silence as your heart grapples for a connection between you and that little creature
both small little things striving to survive in a world too large, too bright, too crowded yet too empty
chasing freedom like a child chases a dream.
the moment passes.
your heart regains pace and your mind whirs with the lonely static of too much me time
you are ruining your life
not realising you’re weaker to suffer than you’d be if you tried to heal
Oct 24, 2019
Oct 24, 2019 at 10:55 AM UTC
Labyrinths and crypts of cold stone
Ever shifting and strange
Led me to that forgotten chapel
I stepped inside its narthex
Distant and remote
A place only dreams might reach
It was always night there
In the sanctums of that place
Every trespass palpable
Yet the darkness was not consuming
It seemed stagnant and moribund
Weaving vainly around the pillars and pews
Stripped of the fear that darkness brings
It lulled about aimlessly
Trapped within those rotless walls
Waiting for the return of the light
Jul 16, 2017
Jul 16, 2017 at 1:38 AM UTC
the molten self seeps from my skull
misshapen and hollow, screaming in an agony of breath
clawing away the copper veins, tongue lashing into my chest
ribs eroding into crystal sanctums, escaping like rats in black water
Nov 2, 2018
Nov 2, 2018 at 2:40 AM UTC
I hold my standards to an apex inexplicable,
Amalgamate the serendipity bouncing up through every syllable,
Never to extinguish the conquest of a man,
through the echoes of his eyelids that put aside asylum tryna understand.
I ain't shouting to the deaf, nor breathing in the miasma,
I amass a massive mastery and disenchant disaster.
None to believe the heretics denouncing between the flames,
The accusation between falsehoods are strung beneath the names,
A rivalry hosts opinion, incongruent to the mustered memory,
I bode the omens overhead and pray these sanctums hold my enemies.
Oct 21, 2017
Oct 21, 2017 at 4:06 PM UTC
I think not of how hard I slap
how solid a fist feels.
I find contemplating pain, an eager passed time
something gutting.
Like fish hooked on skewers, vididly moving
scoping while the waters fade
breath by breath
choking
I think of crumbled letters
gracing the wooden floors
minor words wrapped in white
pages age
Like heartbreak and bourbon
potent
I think not of tomorrow,
undecided time, a ghost haunting the now
like a grudge, sewn to the flesh
groping nails cling, drawing
blood
I think of cellar doors, hinging on time
of choices that lead to dark realms
where demons whisper
of silver sanctums, wide
open
I ogle mirror glass, finding the ripples vain
I think not of who or how
I think only of a voice, strumming my death
lovingly
Feb 24, 2018
Feb 24, 2018 at 3:15 PM UTC