There are who lord it o'er their fellow-men
With most prevailing tinsel: who unpen
Their baaing vanities, to browse away
The comfortable green and juicy hay
From human pastures; or, O torturing fact!
Who, through an idiot blink, will see unpack'd
Fire-branded foxes to sear up and singe
Our gold and ripe-ear'd hopes. With not one tinge
Of sanctuary splendour, not a sight
Able to face an owl's, they still are dight
By the blear-eyed nations in empurpled vests,
And crowns, and turbans. With unladen *******,
Save of blown self-applause, they proudly mount
To their spirit's perch, their being's high account,
Their tiptop nothings, their dull skies, their thrones--
Amid the fierce intoxicating tones
Of trumpets, shoutings, and belabour'd drums,
And sudden cannon. Ah! how all this hums,
In wakeful ears, like uproar past and gone--
Like thunder clouds that spake to Babylon,
And set those old Chaldeans to their tasks.--
Are then regalities all gilded masks?
No, there are throned seats unscalable
But by a patient wing, a constant spell,
Or by ethereal things that, unconfin'd,
Can make a ladder of the eternal wind,
And poise about in cloudy thunder-tents
To watch the abysm-birth of elements.
Aye, 'bove the withering of old-lipp'd Fate
A thousand Powers keep religious state,
In water, fiery realm, and airy bourne;
And, silent as a consecrated urn,
Hold sphery sessions for a season due.
Yet few of these far majesties, ah, few!
Have bared their operations to this globe--
Few, who with gorgeous pageantry enrobe
Our piece of heaven--whose benevolence
Shakes hand with our own Ceres; every sense
Filling with spiritual sweets to plenitude,
As bees gorge full their cells. And, by the feud
'Twixt Nothing and Creation, I here swear,
Eterne Apollo! that thy Sister fair
Is of all these the gentlier-mightiest.
When thy gold breath is misting in the west,
She unobserved steals unto her throne,
And there she sits most meek and most alone;
As if she had not pomp subservient;
As if thine eye, high Poet! was not bent
Towards her with the Muses in thine heart;
As if the ministring stars kept not apart,
Waiting for silver-footed messages.
O Moon! the oldest shades '**** oldest trees
Feel palpitations when thou lookest in:
O Moon! old boughs lisp forth a holier din
The while they feel thine airy fellowship.
Thou dost bless every where, with silver lip
Kissing dead things to life. The sleeping kine,
Couched in thy brightness, dream of fields divine:
Innumerable mountains rise, and rise,
Ambitious for the hallowing of thine eyes;
And yet thy benediction passeth not
One obscure hiding-place, one little spot
Where pleasure may be sent: the nested wren
Has thy fair face within its tranquil ken,
And from beneath a sheltering ivy leaf
Takes glimpses of thee; thou art a relief
To the poor patient oyster, where it sleeps
Within its pearly house.--The mighty deeps,
The monstrous sea is thine--the myriad sea!
O Moon! far-spooming Ocean bows to thee,
And Tellus feels his forehead's cumbrous load.

  Cynthia! where art thou now? What far abode
Of green or silvery bower doth enshrine
Such utmost beauty? Alas, thou dost pine
For one as sorrowful: thy cheek is pale
For one whose cheek is pale: thou dost bewail
His tears, who weeps for thee. Where dost thou sigh?
Ah! surely that light peeps from Vesper's eye,
Or what a thing is love! 'Tis She, but lo!
How chang'd, how full of ache, how gone in woe!
She dies at the thinnest cloud; her loveliness
Is wan on Neptune's blue: yet there's a stress
Of love-spangles, just off yon cape of trees,
Dancing upon the waves, as if to please
The curly foam with amorous influence.
O, not so idle: for down-glancing thence
She fathoms eddies, and runs wild about
O'erwhelming water-courses; scaring out
The thorny sharks from hiding-holes, and fright'ning
Their savage eyes with unaccustomed lightning.
Where will the splendor be content to reach?
O love! how potent hast thou been to teach
Strange journeyings! Wherever beauty dwells,
In gulf or aerie, mountains or deep dells,
In light, in gloom, in star or blazing sun,
Thou pointest out the way, and straight 'tis won.
Amid his toil thou gav'st Leander breath;
Thou leddest Orpheus through the gleams of death;
Thou madest Pluto bear thin element;
And now, O winged Chieftain! thou hast sent
A moon-beam to the deep, deep water-world,
To find Endymion.

                  On gold sand impearl'd
With lily shells, and pebbles milky white,
Poor Cynthia greeted him, and sooth'd her light
Against his pallid face: he felt the charm
To breathlessness, and suddenly a warm
Of his heart's blood: 'twas very sweet; he stay'd
His wandering steps, and half-entranced laid
His head upon a tuft of straggling weeds,
To taste the gentle moon, and freshening beads,
Lashed from the crystal roof by fishes' tails.
And so he kept, until the rosy veils
Mantling the east, by Aurora's peering hand
Were lifted from the water's breast, and fann'd
Into sweet air; and sober'd morning came
Meekly through billows:--when like taper-flame
Left sudden by a dallying breath of air,
He rose in silence, and once more 'gan fare
Along his fated way.

                      Far had he roam'd,
With nothing save the hollow vast, that foam'd
Above, around, and at his feet; save things
More dead than Morpheus' imaginings:
Old rusted anchors, helmets, breast-plates large
Of gone sea-warriors; brazen beaks and targe;
Rudders that for a hundred years had lost
The sway of human hand; gold vase emboss'd
With long-forgotten story, and wherein
No reveller had ever dipp'd a chin
But those of Saturn's vintage; mouldering scrolls,
Writ in the tongue of heaven, by those souls
Who first were on the earth; and sculptures rude
In ponderous stone, developing the mood
Of ancient Nox;--then skeletons of man,
Of beast, behemoth, and leviathan,
And elephant, and eagle, and huge jaw
Of nameless monster. A cold leaden awe
These secrets struck into him; and unless
Dian had chaced away that heaviness,
He might have died: but now, with cheered feel,
He onward kept; wooing these thoughts to steal
About the labyrinth in his soul of love.

  "What is there in thee, Moon! that thou shouldst move
My heart so potently? When yet a child
I oft have dried my tears when thou hast smil'd.
Thou seem'dst my sister: hand in hand we went
From eve to morn across the firmament.
No apples would I gather from the tree,
Till thou hadst cool'd their cheeks deliciously:
No tumbling water ever spake romance,
But when my eyes with thine thereon could dance:
No woods were green enough, no bower divine,
Until thou liftedst up thine eyelids fine:
In sowing time ne'er would I dibble take,
Or drop a seed, till thou wast wide awake;
And, in the summer tide of blossoming,
No one but thee hath heard me blithly sing
And mesh my dewy flowers all the night.
No melody was like a passing spright
If it went not to solemnize thy reign.
Yes, in my boyhood, every joy and pain
By thee were fashion'd to the self-same end;
And as I grew in years, still didst thou blend
With all my ardours: thou wast the deep glen;
Thou wast the mountain-top--the sage's pen--
The poet's harp--the voice of friends--the sun;
Thou wast the river--thou wast glory won;
Thou wast my clarion's blast--thou wast my steed--
My goblet full of wine--my topmost deed:--
Thou wast the charm of women, lovely Moon!
O what a wild and harmonized tune
My spirit struck from all the beautiful!
On some bright essence could I lean, and lull
Myself to immortality: I prest
Nature's soft pillow in a wakeful rest.
But, gentle Orb! there came a nearer bliss--
My strange love came--Felicity's abyss!
She came, and thou didst fade, and fade away--
Yet not entirely; no, thy starry sway
Has been an under-passion to this hour.
Now I begin to feel thine orby power
Is coming fresh upon me: O be kind,
Keep back thine influence, and do not blind
My sovereign vision.--Dearest love, forgive
That I can think away from thee and live!--
Pardon me, airy planet, that I prize
One thought beyond thine argent luxuries!
How far beyond!" At this a surpris'd start
Frosted the springing verdure of his heart;
For as he lifted up his eyes to swear
How his own goddess was past all things fair,
He saw far in the concave green of the sea
An old man sitting calm and peacefully.
Upon a weeded rock this old man sat,
And his white hair was awful, and a mat
Of weeds were cold beneath his cold thin feet;
And, ample as the largest winding-sheet,
A cloak of blue wrapp'd up his aged bones,
O'erwrought with symbols by the deepest groans
Of ambitious magic: every ocean-form
Was woven in with black distinctness; storm,
And calm, and whispering, and hideous roar
Were emblem'd in the woof; with every shape
That skims, or dives, or sleeps, 'twixt cape and cape.
The gulphing whale was like a dot in the spell,
Yet look upon it, and 'twould size and swell
To its huge self; and the minutest fish
Would pass the very hardest gazer's wish,
And show his little eye's anatomy.
Then there was pictur'd the regality
Of Neptune; and the sea nymphs round his state,
In beauteous vassalage, look up and wait.
Beside this old man lay a pearly wand,
And in his lap a book, the which he conn'd
So stedfastly, that the new denizen
Had time to keep him in amazed ken,
To mark these shadowings, and stand in awe.

  The old man rais'd his hoary head and saw
The wilder'd stranger--seeming not to see,
His features were so lifeless. Suddenly
He woke as from a trance; his snow-white brows
Went arching up, and like two magic ploughs
Furrow'd deep wrinkles in his forehead large,
Which kept as fixedly as rocky marge,
Till round his wither'd lips had gone a smile.
Then up he rose, like one whose tedious toil
Had watch'd for years in forlorn hermitage,
Who had not from mid-life to utmost age
Eas'd in one accent his o'er-burden'd soul,
Even to the trees. He rose: he grasp'd his stole,
With convuls'd clenches waving it abroad,
And in a voice of solemn joy, that aw'd
Echo into oblivion, he said:--

  "Thou art the man! Now shall I lay my head
In peace upon my watery pillow: now
Sleep will come smoothly to my weary brow.
O Jove! I shall be young again, be young!
O shell-borne Neptune, I am pierc'd and stung
With new-born life! What shall I do? Where go,
When I have cast this serpent-skin of woe?--
I'll swim to the syrens, and one moment listen
Their melodies, and see their long hair glisten;
Anon upon that giant's arm I'll be,
That writhes about the roots of Sicily:
To northern seas I'll in a twinkling sail,
And mount upon the snortings of a whale
To some black cloud; thence down I'll madly sweep
On forked lightning, to the deepest deep,
Where through some ******* pool I will be hurl'd
With rapture to the other side of the world!
O, I am full of gladness! Sisters three,
I bow full hearted to your old decree!
Yes, every god be thank'd, and power benign,
For I no more shall wither, droop, and pine.
Thou art the man!" Endymion started back
Dismay'd; and, like a wretch from whom the rack
Tortures hot breath, and speech of agony,
Mutter'd: "What lonely death am I to die
In this cold region? Will he let me freeze,
And float my brittle limbs o'er polar seas?
Or will he touch me with his searing hand,
And leave a black memorial on the sand?
Or tear me piece-meal with a bony saw,
And keep me as a chosen food to draw
His magian fish through hated fire and flame?
O misery of hell! resistless, tame,
Am I to be burnt up? No, I will shout,
Until the gods through heaven's blue look out!--
O Tartarus! but some few days agone
Her soft arms were entwining me, and on
Her voice I hung like fruit among green leaves:
Her lips were all my own, and--ah, ripe sheaves
Of happiness! ye on the stubble droop,
But never may be garner'd. I must stoop
My head, and kiss death's foot. Love! love, farewel!
Is there no hope from thee? This horrid spell
Would melt at thy sweet breath.--By Dian's hind
Feeding from her white fingers, on the wind
I see thy streaming hair! and now, by Pan,
I care not for this old mysterious man!"

  He spake, and walking to that aged form,
Look'd high defiance. Lo! his heart 'gan warm
With pity, for the grey-hair'd creature wept.
Had he then wrong'd a heart where sorrow kept?
Had he, though blindly contumelious, brought
Rheum to kind eyes, a sting to human thought,
Convulsion to a mouth of many years?
He had in truth; and he was ripe for tears.
The penitent shower fell, as down he knelt
Before that care-worn sage, who trembling felt
About his large dark locks, and faultering spake:

  "Arise, good youth, for sacred Phoebus' sake!
I know thine inmost *****, and I feel
A very brother's yearning for thee steal
Into mine own: for why? thou openest
The prison gates that have so long opprest
My weary watching. Though thou know'st it not,
Thou art commission'd to this fated spot
For great enfranchisement. O weep no more;
I am a friend to love, to loves of yore:
Aye, hadst thou never lov'd an unknown power
I had been grieving at this joyous hour
But even now most miserable old,
I saw thee, and my blood no longer cold
Gave mighty pulses: in this tottering case
Grew a new heart, which at this moment plays
As dancingly as thine. Be not afraid,
For thou shalt hear this secret all display'd,
Now as we speed towards our joyous task."

  So saying, this young soul in age's mask
Went forward with the Carian side by side:
Resuming quickly thus; while ocean's tide
Hung swollen at their backs, and jewel'd sands
Took silently their foot-prints. "My soul stands
Now past the midway from mortality,
And so I can prepare without a sigh
To tell thee briefly all my joy and pain.
I was a fisher once, upon this main,
And my boat danc'd in every creek and bay;
Rough billows were my home by night and day,--
The sea-gulls not more constant; for I had
No housing from the storm and tempests mad,
But hollow rocks,--and they were palaces
Of silent happiness, of slumberous ease:
Long years of misery have told me so.
Aye, thus it was one thousand years ago.
One thousand years!--Is it then possible
To look so plainly through them? to dispel
A thousand years with backward glance sublime?
To breathe away as 'twere all scummy slime
From off a crystal pool, to see its deep,
And one's own image from the bottom peep?
Yes: now I am no longer wretched thrall,
My long captivity and moanings all
Are but a slime, a thin-pervading ****,
The which I breathe away, and thronging come
Like things of yesterday my youthful pleasures.

  "I touch'd no lute, I sang not, trod no measures:
I was a lonely youth on desert shores.
My sports were lonely, 'mid continuous roars,
And craggy isles, and sea-mew's plaintive cry
Plaining discrepant between sea and sky.
Dolphins were still my playmates; shapes unseen
Would let me feel their scales of gold and green,
Nor be my desolation; and, full oft,
When a dread waterspout had rear'd aloft
Its hungry hugeness, seeming ready ripe
To burst with hoarsest thunderings, and wipe
My life away like a vast sponge of fate,
Some friendly monster, pitying my sad state,
Has dived to its foundations, gulph'd it down,
And left me tossing safely. But the crown
Of all my life was utmost quietude:
More did I love to lie in cavern rude,
Keeping in wait whole days for Neptune's voice,
And if it came at last, hark, and rejoice!
There blush'd no summer eve but I would steer
My skiff along green shelving coasts, to hear
The shepherd's pipe come clear from aery steep,
Mingled with ceaseless bleatings of his sheep:
And never was a day of summer shine,
But I beheld its birth upon the brine:
For I would watch all night to see unfold
Heaven's gates, and Aethon snort his morning gold
Wide o'er the swelling streams: and constantly
At brim of day-tide, on some grassy lea,
My nets would be spread out, and I at rest.
The poor folk of the sea-country I blest
With daily boon of fish most delicate:
They knew not whence this bounty, and elate
Would strew sweet flowers on a sterile beach.

  "Why was I not contented? Wherefore reach
At things which, but for thee, O Latmian!
Had been my dreary death? Fool! I began
To feel distemper'd longings: to desire
The utmost priv

In the land of Coleridge and his Ancient Mariner,
    In a time of coal fires, wooden boats and horsepower,
There is a story of the Lynmouth Lifeboat Louisa
    And the night horse and man over 13 miles pulled her.

Two of the afternoon clock struck a chime,
    On January 12th, 1899.
The wind howled and the sea it roared,
    Flooding ports and railways, taking off windows and doors.
The ship, Forest Hall, with masts a three
    Was being towed up Bristol Channel with a crew of 15.
Bound for Liverpool, at St. David’s Head she cast off,
    But the wind, it blew stronger and the waters grew rough.
Suddenly the cable grew taught and then snapped,
    The tugboat immediately came about to get back.
For over an hour they tried to re-fix the line
    But the storm was upon them, they had run out of time.
Captain Uliss made haste to anchor at bay
    But another obstacle was thrown in their way.
The rudder of the Forest Hall was broken by a squall,
    To the mercy of Poseidon and ****** they were all.
The ships’ anchor dragged, no purchase it found
    The ship was headed for Exmoor’s rough ground
At 6:33pm a telegraph was sent
    From Porlock to Lynmouth the Postmaster went
“Large vessel. Distress. Offshore Porlock”
    Five minutes later the first signal rocket went off
Out into the pounding rain they ran
    Those lifeboatmen and locals to lend them a hand
The waves loomed over the watch tower on the pier,
    Then crashed down in fury which deafened the ear
“Tis hopeless” the Coxswain, Jack Crocombe, said he
    “ain’t a crew in the service who could launch safely”
“From a more sheltered station we’ll call a new boat”
    And to the post-office they went, to send a telegraph out
Tap, tap, tap on the Morse key he pressed
    But nothing was happening, there was no line left
Blown down by the storm, and all hope with it,
    “The duty is ours, but we cannot fulfil it”.


Part 2:
“The duty is ours, it’s us or nobody” he shouts
    “it can’t never be nobody, go we must”
The protests did start, and questions did fall,
    But the Coxswain had an answer to silence them all
“Now, I know that we can’t launch her from ‘ere”
    “but it’s thirteen miles to Porlock Weir”
The voices were shouting, no one knew what to do
    But the Second Coxswain’s voice carried on through
“Jack, we’ll need ‘osses, every ‘oss can be spared”
    “if we got enough power, we’ll get her there”
The choice had been made, the die had been cast,
    The crew had a plan, a solution at last
Around came the Lifeboat Louisa, so grand
    Standing 34ft long and 7ft wide on land
3.5 tonnes was her unladen mass
    The add thirteen crew, oars, rigging and two masts
The shafts had been fitted to the carriage with ease,
    Rarely used but kept in the boathouse for needs
The horses were hitched, the carriage coupled on.
    In total, the train was one hundred and thirty foot long
“Right then” said the Coxswain “let’s be off”
    “up Countisbury Hill!” but as soon as they started, they stopped.
The horses did not pull together as a team,
    The wheels were stuck in the parapet, of the bridge over the stream
In minutes it was fixed, and it started again
    This time all horses were pulling the same.
Up Countisbury hill, they walked on and on,
    Until they reached open ground, then the protection was gone
The rain thundered down; the wind raged again
    Still the team kept on going, the pace slow and same.
All of a sudden, the carriage plunged to the right,
    A four-foot wheel came off, then rolled out of sight
“There’s a wheel off!” the cry rang “get them scotches under!”
    It was the front offside wheel that was causing this blunder
Nearly forty minutes it took to replace the wheel
    Still the great storm refused to heel
But then they were off, nearly conquered the hill
    But many more challenges faced them still.
The Blue Ball Inn marks Countisbury Hill peak
    And hot cocoa and brandy helped restore the weak.
Now they pressed on, ten miles to go.
    They were making good progress but painfully slow.


Part 3:
The rain had stopped, the lamps shone bright,
    This brave crew continued through the night.
The party had by now reached Ashton Lane
    Where their troubles soon were to begin again
On this narrow road, the walls were strong and thick
    Impassable for the carriage, but Coxswain Jack had a trick
“We’ll pull the boat through the lane on the skids”
    “The carriage can go o’er the moors with the kids”
So once again horse and train were detached
    A new plan at work, only recently hatched
Eight horses pulled the carriage away,
    Leaving ten to continue to Porlock Bay.
The boat was pulled down Ashton Lane
    Later, all men agreed this was the worst part of the way.
Mud underneath, and walls closing in
    Barely inches to move and soaked to the skin
Boast, horses and carriage finally together again
    Made their way onwards, leaving the lane
Half past one, on that stormy black morn
    County Gate was passed, conversation was born
The crew started talking, spirits, they grew
    But a challenge was coming and this they all knew
Porlock Hill was coming their way,
    Navigating this death path was tricky even in the day.


Part 4:
Porlock Hill, as the locals say
    Is the devil incarnate come night or day
But the brave men from Lynmouth at the top they stopped
    Safety chains, drag ropes and skid pans were fitted against the clock
Four horses at the front to control the bends
    Ten at the back plus men to see this through to the end
Down the twists and turns the crawled
    On the drag ropes and harnesses, man and horse hauled
Round the last corner “We’ve done it!” “We’re down!”
    Sighs let out, smiles put on, it was an inspiring sound
Then all at once, morale took a plunge down,
    As they stared at the entrance to Porlock Town.
Old Widow Washford had a cottage this end,
    It would be impossible for the carriage to round the bend
The wall of the garden would have to come down
    So, the crew started trying to widen the ground
“What are ye thinking at this time o’ night?”
    “How dare ye start bangin! Gave me a fright”
Old Widow Washford’s head poked through the door
    Was there no end to the troubles faced on this moor?
Once again, the Coxswain had the answer and said
    “Don’t worry, we’re just widening the road dear. Go back to bed”
The old woman was dressed and out in a flash
    Shouting encouragement, soon the wall was hashed.
Six inches more, they needed to pass
    The corner of the cottage came off at last.
Five of the clock struck the morning chime,
    For most people here, that was rising time.
Out of the town, and past the Ship Inn
    The last part of their journey was soon to begin.


Part 5:
Half past five when they reached Porlock Weir
    They were soon stopped by people when drew near.
“You can’t go no further” the Anchor Hotel Landlord said
    “the road’s gone, Jack, to the beach, nothing’s left”
Only half a mile stood ‘tween the crew and their goal
    They would not let this stop them, oh no.
The top road they took, almost as narrow as Ashton Lane
    An exercise none of them wanted to repeat again.
The train drew on, till they reached a tree
    An old Laburnum standing between them and the sea.
Down it came and then back on their way
    The light was beginning to turn night to day.
The boat reached the beach, the flares had been lit,
    The ****** poised with their oars, ready to hit.
Holding the stop, Second Coxswain yelled “HAUL”
    And down shot the Louisa, into the squall
The oars struck together, through the roaring sea
    Sails hoisted, oars beating, wind blowing hatefully.

It was on the morning Friday 13th January,
    That Lifeboat Louisa of Lynmouth launched at Porlock from Countisbury.
Ten and a half hours, over thirteen miles
    This crew and their boat had endured many trails
The Forest Hall was reach, her crew all safe
    Back to the mainland they made at pace.


Jack Crocombe, George Richards, Charles Crick, Richard Burgess,
    Richard Ridler, David Crocombe, Bertram Pennicott, William Jarvis.
George Rawle, William Richards and John Ward
    John Riddler, E.J. Peddar and Richard Moore.

All of them crew members on that historic day
    And for this they are remembered in every way.


But I give my thanks to the crew mate who gave this story to me,
    My Great Great Grandfather, Lynmouth Lifeboatman
        William Sellick Pugsley.


Sophie J Pugsley
Great Great Granddaughter of crewmate William Pugsley of the Lynmouth Lifeboat Service.

Bent to a slouch,
unbeknownst…

That we walk
never unladen.

And perhaps only later,
burdened
by the wreaths
around our necks.

A great chasm gaping but no words are escaping and it feels like I'm skating on ice.
Nice though it may be each day comes to slay me as the morning breaks open my eyes.
It cuts through my skin as it finds a way in and I want to get out but cannot,that spot in the sky burns me down and I die into daylight once more.
I am trapped on the scrapheap where sleep is the answer and the question unset, is this moment in time where I get the unsettling feeling that my life is just peeling away,
the chasm spreads wide like the tide's going out and I find I can't swim but the day's already in and so it's going to be fine.

Then the wine flows like evening that goes on and on and the bottle once full is now gasping,
almost gone.
The ash of the day flusters slowly and gray and the night grasps me tight to her waist.
This tester,this taster of what will be later is enough for the hour of me,I see  trees bare,unladen with care,I see them full with the blossoms of May and am blinded by beauty,
surely
sore and rocked by these cores which are central,essential and necessary to me where the elements line up and the squadron I see forms the form of all things
and the conclusion I come too is that all things will come true as each day I break out of breaks through into me.

While searching for unladen skies,
he came across a magpie resting in
a clear patch of swept dirt at his mangled feet.
(and here the story begins, don’t you think?)
Wait—
Do I intimidate you?
With my silken sashay of solicited yet lavish and rattled ramifications?
Complicated, complex logic behind words you don’t know—
words like sonder, opia, and undulate,
euphonious, sempiternal, and sisyphean.
You called them ‘fancy words’,
as if they are dressed for a masked ball and
in elegant suits and dresses, or someplace in-between,
they are dancing the waltz across marble mezzanines behind grey crenellations.
I’m not asking for the meaning of life or great quintessential and quaint questions,
but yet you ponder what’s after death before looking upon my countenance.
Do I require an irascible attitude in ninth grade, forced to be seen,
a scathing cascade of inward curses, each more extensive than the last?
(*******, *******, *******, and a variety of words meaning **** and ******)
So ashamed to fail, as though I belong to a singular meaning and no other.
I tell you now, I am not
crisscrossed with sultry language and full of your ‘can’t’ attitudes.
Whether I make you work or lie in agony over a line,
the job is to provide not pain, but—
understanding, comfort, hiraeth, empathy,
a place for anger, loneliness, emptiness
and inexpressible language…
but as words are only one facet to this endless complication,
I think you should pay attention to the small things.
But I won't dictate your life,
I’m only a broken magpie confined to earth,
Clothed in feathers and ultimatums.

Absolute Far Fetch
Colossal Mafioso
Act Alive Tyrant

Hell Broken Daisy
Delete Everyone But You
Strike A Match, New Blaze

*******, King Trainwreck
Unladen Swallow, **** ****
Devour Comfort

The yellow man burst into the tea shop
With his bride in his arms and his eyes full of sunlight
“Look at my beautiful wife!”
said he
“See how she glows!
Blessed is me!
For nobody knows
the bedazzlement of the glance
the electricity of the trace
the tenderness of the honey glazed lips
and fond stroke of the face
of the lover who is truly yours.”
And the gray man scoffed in odium
With a hint of despair
“Silly yellow man,
Don't you know
What love you boast is but a foolish affair?
All good things come to an end
And therefore I recommend
You put away your heart lest it be crushed”
The yellow man paused and looked on with pity
“Gray fellow, which maiden
Hath done such damage upon your soul?
Why are you repulsed
And your heart unladen?”
And the gray man looked down at the floor
With an air of shame
“Love is but an unfair game I fear
In which I have been cheated
And love has been unkind to me.”

(Only a large, knife-wielding ******-lover could stop me now...only jests in nature lobular, ductal, medullary, mucinous, papillary & adeno-cystic can spread me thinly across the veneer that is cultura Americano...bad man, sad man, Saddam Hussein insisted that the kangaroo court be adjourned to pray. TEACH of tetchy ta-ta, tulips & tangles, philanthropy & misanthropy, trekking with Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa, of sitting around with a chair manufacturer and throwing tantrums with Jesse Jackson and of easing back the throttle on entering Central Station. These are the things, oh yeah!!! : the things semi-fine and super smooth that parade aces by queens; that jade unladen churls in admixtures unrefined; that pull on pork by the tines of forks that fork about in spooning postures whilst Fords ford the Monongahela as belching Pittsburghers like chubby Timmy Popovich pop dimwitted/small-titted Tammy Bozovich of Mount Washington on Mount Washing-ton in a city marred by the unmarried, oh yeah!!! (denounced x 6) Next (some easy nap): Harrowing testimonies of abuse from within the Catholic church...of the alphabetized bulls, bull A being the first, number five is the most inclined to steal your lunch money; Buddha bug = Budapest; Gary the *** is from Hungary...Commercial toothpaste manufacturers advise you to expectorate their ****-uct as it contains: stannous fluoride (the class-2 toxin) and (the inorganic tin compounds): stannous chloride, stannous sulfide & stannic oxide. It remains for us to protect our personalized/personable nervous systems vigilantly; to guard against the polytopes... The wages of sin is death. The wages of ******* is small. The A's & B's of Beatles' tunes: “Can't Buy Me Love”/“Can Sell Your Hate”; “I Want to Hold Your Hand”/“You Refuse to Release my Foot.” The Beatles sang: “Golden slumbers fill your eyes; Smiles await you when you rise; Sleep pretty darling; Do not cry; And I will sing a lullaby,” which begs the question: “How am I supposed to sleep with you hippies belting out lullabies?” The ultimate act of stupidity is naming my stinking chihuahua Chico Harrison because he smells like the crapped-out Paul McCartney who hasn't even crapped out yet. A murderous rampage earns for you a Medal of Honor citation. [My deep, abiding hatred for women is ******* by my deep, abiding hatred for men.] Opening salvo to my tome next: “So passionately did my wife smother me with kisses that I feared for my life...” or: “My wife's kisses resurrected a passion in me not known since our honeymoon till I realized that it was the garbage-man and not the wife at all...” or even: “'Pucker up!' I instructed as I have just watched an old Jane Russell bra commercial...”

Stead he, once aloft high mountains
the ravine bellowed upon tides unsung,
sought lands unbeknownst to him
far across oceans as daffodils chirped
to be still whilst robins burned
and hound the tasteless nectar
ripped asunder underneath the spiral shelled slimy chained beasts ...

Once it was that everlasting agony
could not fulfill perfunctory oaths whiche'r
sunken tribe prided upon,
the chieftain adorned in his garland of skulls
satiated his pains within lofts of fire.
Sparks clouded the presumptuous begat holy water
and knives wound heretofore hate ridden bellies,
carved with rusted blades and bent iron
With each bell rung, a million epochs tumbled.
and Thus hovered the pledgion, crying hoofs and browbeaten droughts
in all splendor and prose !
Giant trees stood before him
reproaching the presence of bygone feet
loud was the rustle and harsh were the uncurling leaves
to be withered away by blackened seeds.

In halted symphonies did cries of woe recede before
hate blurred lines that fear devised,
and pride begrudged asunder, crones of fruitless endeavour
towards sunken cloth and forsaken joys;
Instinct upon reach lay before he
"Whereupon this glance is my whittled bride
she who prattles about in surreality ?"
the silence followed the swift tail wind and met the brittle spear
****** herein, louting jaundiced rendezvous and accoutrements winked into
by lonely hearts shrouded in frivolous tones of mystery.
But falter not did he,
for men do seldom bathe in the harness of failure
rather than crows mimic the nests of sparrows
so that every twitch lauded and immortality spanned by darkened visages
cawed into the blood, hitherto plucked in tarry reeds;
He came upon a fork
and wondered aloud "why is there but a nested abandon 'ere -
soaked fragrance and ridicule greets but the seldom few
who dare challenge the beast that lay within;
wary of unwoken lust bound in shiny drudgery,
be it ignorance that compels the starving
that voyages sown upon tapestries raw,
could take shape in weary eyes
and nascent tears of milk,flood the bow
yet unstruck by ignoble appetites of unladen treachery
while lurked prey lament the sharpened
sow of her majesty's trumpet ground in dust through
riveting songs of intertwined floods
adorned in destiny and swindled by fate !"

"Now look here, to the west" , the voice cried
for riches to be held in weight vanished the annals writ within
"Cry to me the sorrows to be laden
by growing tendons and grudges herein.
In these pangs of misery do I dream of the morrow,
of countless sunlights upon the flesh of misery
and wings that glide amidst tenuous storms",
For neither did mountain nor river below
do little to fasten a shade of warmth and passionate sin,
halt either stride or furrow
With which giants leaped across corpses of devils
and men scribed souls towards glimpses of voluptuous grins.
"Lend but an ear, to the magical east,
at laughter glowing and talons lauded
with unsung whispers raked in sun belied rot,
and sagely jests upon magisterial gods"

Thus ends his journey to fallowed ravines,
bound in knowledge and in blood,
O Men, Speak no more of his glorious persona!
As mercy beckons for grace to begin
and with fallen stupor groweth wisdom
to be perched upon desire unfulfilled but lulled into unity,
As twilight echoes through dawn like rumbling snow capped peaks
and the orange night succumbs to starlight with fateful longing
So does he peruse the forsaken trail
forevermore, and at ever last.