A midnight ship with silver sails
And hoisted flags with scarlet tails
Is whisked by winds of golden gales
                    Descending from the skies above.

And though the decks are wet and soaken,
Still the hull is swift and oaken
So the course remains unbroken,
                    Trailing wakes of turtledoves.

With storm departed, then no sooner
Comes, unseen, a pirate schooner
Neath the nighttime, light and lunar,
                    Pouncing with a push and shove.

Though hope seems lost, a cyclone saves
Dispersing foes and other knaves
With frothy foamy ****** waves
                    Which strike like leaden leather gloves.

Secured, the ship has safely landed
- Left behind, the pirates stranded -
Passers-by are smiling candid,
                    Knowing not the worth thereof.

For hidden in the wooden hold
Is treasure bursting unforetold
- Far more than diamonds, thyme and gold -
                    It brings unbound a brother’s Love.

Still I am here, confined in my prison of eroded leather and rusted coils.
Oceans of yellow-gray fur glisten lifelessly around my tired, time-soaken feet.
More shining dust leaps out per every passing moment, as if reaching for freedom, only to find itself grounded in a muddled swamp of suicide.  
Such is its existence.  
Such is mine.  I know very little about the time I spent before Qualm.  
Such memories are forgotten.  
Then again, some memories are best left forgotten.

In this room, time itself fades.
It is a vault of dust, of which I will soon become.  
The dust waves to me sometimes.  
It swirls and scatters and dances in victory before it dooms itself to the inevitable.  
Alas, it seems gravity prefers a yellow-brown carpet.  
The drapes too.  
It seems I have forgotten the last time the carpet matched the drapes.  

There’s one window.  
I know not what lies on the outside of it.  
It is a place I don’t deem worthy.
For what purpose does dust serve outside of these prison walls?  

The Boy comes every so often.
Not that time matters.
The clock-face has frowned and judged me as long as I remember.  Its broken hand beats back and forth as if it were some melancholic metronome.  
The pounding heartbeat of the clock is halted only by The Boy.  He is quite a curious boy.  
He doesn’t seem to age, though perhaps it hasn’t been quite long enough to tell.
Or perhaps it is I who has simply forgotten what aging looks like.

The Boy tells me tales of love, of a girl he has found.  
He spoils her.  
I once had a boy like him, but through my tranquil insanity, it seems he I have forgotten.
I once held him, though.  
He was but a small child.  
A smooth, softly crowned head that radiated possibility.  
Yes, The Boy reminds me of mine own blood-kin.  
If Mine Own had lived to see him, what would he say?

I have not a name for myself.  
I have long forgotten how to string letters together and what a sentence looks like.  
The Boy knows, though.  For as long as I have seen him (which of course I know not), he has called me by a name that I have long forgotten the meaning of.  
The Boy is curious, indeed.
The name he gives me is not the name as what they call me.
It is warm, and sings of a tranquil flame and soft bed of which I have long forgotten.
It is like a firefly of emotion in my corroded universe.  
The Boy’s handiwork is miraculous, I do say.  
The needle with which The Boy stitches letters is of ivory bane, and the thread of luminescent gold.

The Boy is clever.  
He tells me tales of brains.  
Long ago (or perhaps within the hour) The Boy would tell me of studies.
He would read me stories of glistening raindrops and heaven-bound sunflowers from a glossy green textbook, and would ask of me how numbers collided and combined.  
I would take his hand.  
It was soft.
It was warm.
It reminded me of my own blood-kin.  
What would Mine Own’s hand look like if he could come to see The Boy?  
It seems I have forgotten when The Boy’s ******* questions ended.  
Why did they stop?  
Why were there columns of water falling from his cheeks?  
Columns that supported none but a weary neck of childish ignorance.
Columns that were polished by sandpaper.  
Columns that gleamed with a lifeless luster.  
Columns that were silent, yet spoke of nothing but demise.

The Boy no longer tells me tales of brains.  
It seems I have forgotten the stories of mournful raindrops and hellbent sunflowers from the faded green textbook.  
He tells me tales of sorrows of a boy of an all-too familiar name.  
Of a boy who reminds me of Mine Own.  
No, in fact, The Boy says nothing.  
It is his columns that sing of Diego’s caterwaul.

For what does The Boy mourn?
Is it not his studies?  
Is it not his plentiful future?  
The Boy has but nothing to mourn.  
He touched my hand, I remember, and apologized (for some event I have seem to forgotten) through merciful cries and heart-wrenching sobs.  
My hand.  
My time-soaken hand, worn from years of labor at the needle.  
His hand is calloused.  
Was there a time where The Boy held the same hands as mine own blood-kin?
Did they ever stare each other in the eye and wonder, "How would God see me?"
I fear I must have misspoken, for when I mentioned this to The Boy, he fell.  
With an eloquent shame The Boy stitched the most beautifully morbid quilt of words.  
His voice echoed hymns of remorse within me.  
The Boy mourned.  
But for what?
Is it not his own tears that collide with the yellow-gray dust?  
Is it not he that stands with a prideful cowardice above me, judging me with the same heartbroken eyes as the metronome clock-face?  
In fact, could it not be The Boy whose ashen tears litter this corroded floorboard?  
Could it be my own?  
For what am I mourning?  
The clock-face grants me an apathetic stare, or perhaps it is The Boy.  
Could it possibly be The Boy whom I am mourning?
For if it is not him, then where have I come from?

He took the series of images as a bad omen,
He whisked up the dust
From ache soaken boots,
From a long painful journey,
He crossed through the desperate world,
This world which is confused,
This world that feels the burning scent of chaos,
The world that has birthed the unknown,
The world where reluctance begins at birth,
The site of a cosmic reaction,
Far growing,
Yet we haven’t left the dark ages,
Where the horizon beats constantly,
And the tides roll in,
And the only ones we have to blame are ourselves,
We curse and spat,
In each other’s eyes,
We’ll poke and ****,
With itchy fingers,
Trying to unearth disaster,

What had become of the lost November?
Where are they?
Where have the people that understood gone to,
Where is the Bukowski voice heard,
In this day and age,
Where did the true humans go?
The spirits still chant and riot,
Glowing in there,
With a mistiful, sorrowful song,
That I will never get to know,
Different times,
Different filigrees surround different lives,
In these trying times.

There goes an ocean road
And none other is there of its kind:
Where systems meet on earth below—
There languids creep on agéd line:

And languids chatter in their fears
Soon random ones would fall away,
To walk this road to distant earth,
To one distant in distant name:

And no great lesson this road will teach
In the deep blue mystic that lead the souls:
On soaken road, these languids creep
In bottom's deep on ocean soil.

Bottle tops and plastic bags, cardboard cups and empty wraps.
Silver foil the chocolate gone and Mc Donalds bags blown along.
Dog mess left by lazy owners and cigarette butts tosed and thrown.
The rain so fine it frosts your glasses, the wind blows it and soaks your mac.
Shake dog shake as the rain soaks in, passing freinds as we walk by, the doorman always gives him a pat.
Then pass the noise of the latest gig as we come to where he likes to sit.
A pint of Guinness for his soaken dad and pats and cuddles from all his fans.

The old pictures are out in the rain
soaken wet
tears of my pain
I engulfed them in flames
and asked myself
am I to blame?

The House On The Hill

Bleak, the naked
     windswept lanes,
Lashing skin,
    unforgiving rains

Drenching tatty,
     flapping drapes
In a flurry
     of flightless capes.

And aged eyes
     of darts and stares
Catch new lovers
     unawares,

Flitting from sky
     to window frame,
Dashing with
     their hearts aflame.

Inside, outside
     and under eaves,
Upturned collars
     and soaken sleeves,

Seeking shelter
     from heaven's spill,
Beckoned by
     the house on the hill.

Warmly wafts
     to welcome them
With lamplit porch
     and lacey hem,

Wry smiles
     and buttered toast,
Courtesy of
     the resident ghost.

Old lady, with your
     heart that bleeds,
Dweller in your
     loveless needs,

Lonely in your
     shadowy niche,
What trickery will your
     soul unleash?

Jealous shadows,
     creaking floors
Opening windows
     and slamming doors,

Trapped young hearts
     lay at your feet,
To beat no more
     their wreckless beat.

Seething, writhing,
     crimson drips,
Sweetly tasted
     on bitter lips,

Beside their lifeless
     essence rise
With mouths aghast
     and fading eyes.

The clock ticks,
     the hours pass,
Silence befalls,
     in dreams, at last,

No murderous widow,
     their lives, could take
Nor break their hearts
     before they wake.

Stretching limbs
     and sunkissed yawn
A sigh of relief,
     a welcomed dawn,

To wander life
     as wise old fools,
To knock death's door
     before death calls.

Frail, in cumbersome,
     aging skin,
Where no more passion
     beats within

A little old couple,
     with time to ****
Make their home
     in the house on the hill.

© RJVHorton2015

there one storm
a day of falling grey
skies fell like glass shards
on me
here in Eden,
the window blowing free with rain sleet
I grabbed and ran my soaken papers
into a closet with one apple.
I felt I might need to
start an Ark building, the furious nature barking wild
I cried alone fearful in misery
when
yesterday was so calm and  hope filled my worlds.
I wound myself into a ball, a womb I sought,
I scribbled a little word
in the notebook, just before the storm broke the glass from heaven melted the black clouds parted.
It was ******.

It was once filled with joy;
    it used to blossom in the sun
    but after being stuck in a few storms
    the rain from its petals continue to run

What was once the highlight of a sunny day;
    became a soaken delight
    only wishing that one day
    it’ll be happy from the roots that its soil writes

This Abandoned Flower;
    defines its own beauty but it only ignores
    the true meaning behind the uniqueness that’s instored
    within the essence of its pistil
    & maybe one day, it’ll grow to love what makes it so blissful

Poetic Venom

OOPS  .. OH WELL ..

You walked out of the shower no towel
I dropped my camera on the floor
Click  click  click  click on it went
And then click a few times more

What do you think your doing she said
I told her I dropped my camera on the floor
As she bent  to pick it up just then and
It  clicked away a few more for sure

I took it off her and put it away in its sack
Good thing I have another one put away
Its an expensive piece of camers too
I'll remove that battery later come what may

A camera with a mind of its own I think
I said it might not work now anyway
As it got completely soaken wet for sure
I kicked it under the bed and there to stay

Grabbed a bottle of wine to save some time
I could hear it under there clicking still
My goodness if you buy a new camera mate
Make sure its not a lifelong battery and a will

terrence michael sutton
copyright 2018

Fale don, up to our pride, we fail again
Stride fast! Gone throughout wind and cold held bare
Amidst round planes and crook’d temptations gain
Oh gospel teach us how with pride and prayer

For she, the wicked temptress lies in sleep
While we, the wicked yarns spun deeply ill
Aghast at her fine look, we trip and weep
At she, who drags the soaken mass downhill

We plead and sob, our faltered petals burnt
Our throats strung hoarse, for we are weak without
her kiss, ripped up from deep below the urn
Just as we are made finally devout

Oh celebrate my friends, we’re free once more
But only to be drawn back in her score