The Macabre Poems [Part Two: poems 18-33]





18) Rhymester’s Shadow

With roots and filled-in hollow air,
He writes to you poetic obscurities;
He goes, my friend, where
The homeless dare: where
“Beauty is for the few” and into
The boundless cosmos and tombs;
Into and onto exotic landscapes,
Where poems—like bones—
Have decomposed;
Where darkness comes like all shadows:
To lock you in its tombs….

Dim and gray is his twilight,
As slowly dies his days—
But fate’s poetic obscurities,
Would have it no other way:
For the Rhymester’s shadows—
Never rest.

19) The Executioner of Chan Chan

Writ after visiting Chan Chan, an archeological site in Northern Peru.

Hungry, fearless, in a faceless form,
Likened to a mask, a monster forlorn,
He was the woe, the living dead,
From nightmares he was fed—

The Executioner of Chan Chan.

Bleak was his dawn, cold his heart,
Lulled by those whom would soon die—
Subdued by the temples’ mud-baked
Bricks—he decapitated his lot, sacrificially—

This Moche Warrior of Chan Chan.

April 29 2004 [8:00 PM].

20) Mercury’s Demise
(As Semyas meets Azaz’el)

Part of a story—writ a few hours before a flight from St. Paul to South America.

Mercury! Such awful sight
Planet of darkness, with no eyes,
Ware the Great Asteroids that bite:
The sun no longer gives you light….

A hellish moment: your demise,
Candles blown out, like blinded eyes:
Dust resides in your volcanic skies—
Two souls are left, that want to die.

April 2, 2004

21) Buried Souls from the Rephaim

And there his sarcophagus lay—
Beneath the towering mountains—
Stretching out of the deep, dark sea
(With all its weight, sealing his fate)—
No light, no day, only binding chains.
Lost, forgotten in the sand’s density….

Where no travelers have yet been:
No roads or skies to befriend;
Faceless skeletons, silent voices:
They all embraced in this veil of dark—
Embraced by looks, face to face—
Hungry to fill the emptiness of space.

Note: The Refaim Circle, otherwise known as the ‘Gilgal Refaim,’ is the only megalithic astronomical complex on earth, built 3000 BC, in the area now known as: the Golan Heights; made out of 37,000 tons of stones. It has been said it was constructed y biblical giants; comprising more area than at the Gaza pyramids.

22) The Poet Demon

“There are maggots under my feet,
Incense and madness in my tomb,”
He cries…he sighs, he never dies:
He dances to flutes, tapping feet,
And human fleece, and never knows why.

Oh yes, a tomb—with no spine,
Full of hopelessness, despair…
Sacrificial-gloom everywhere;
A hooded serpent of the deep,
He knows that he will never sleep.

23) The Birds of Genovesa

The beautiful gloom of Genovesa’s
Unfathomable vaults of birds
Peering from white eerie wooden sticks—
Vampires: Atlantean Vampires—
Clinging to trees that look like twigs,
Great idols looming—homelessly—
Your days belong to a primal calendar
I see….

10:30 AM, April 23 2004

Note: Written four hours after leaving the island of Genovesa, in the Galapagos.

24) The Devil’s Rose

Roses of black and orange
From hell’s cryptic doors,
They are scorned—lo,
Like blood in a storm:
Bred by malefic jackals,
Hell-howling Hyenas—
Sealed in coffins by nails,
Incarcerating their evil enchantments;
Guarded by the Demon Ghost, alas—
Should a rose be lost or stolen,
It puts blood—upon the soul!—
Cold, cold—blood.

This is the forbidden rose—
Descended from Satan’s breath,
Made from his waste—puss and piss,
His vomit and sweat, his blasphemy
Inside the scent.

Incantations echo, emitted;
Discharged, from its pores:
Should you pass it to another,
Take it as a gift—
You seal your death.

April 6 2004, Lima, Peru

25) Hieroglyphs of Doom

I’m always surprised
How an artist can make
Ugliness, death, gloom
Decay, demonic-hues—
And Satan himself look…
Lovely.

The tomb and urn, darkness,
Plague, crawling toads, slime:
All vanish into uncharted
Flares of solar fire—
Fires of beautiful light?

I’m always surprised
How the atheist seals,
Locks his tomb—while
Looking, looking for light!

Successfully, we slowly carve
Our hieroglyphs of doom.

3:30 PM, April 14 2004, Lima, Peru

26) Mirrors and Marrow

On this hot and cold, bold,
Windy earth, with its breathless
Tireless twists, and curves,
Is not life a street, a city of
Stone, ink and bread—
Of heart, essence and will?
Where arched-holy steeples
Tower and blink, at moving
Souls?

Where

Poverty is the mirror for all,
Whence you climb, eternally
Wanting the treasure that,
That to only a few befalls;
In sadness, each part—dies,
Wishing they had climbed more walls.

April 11 2004, Lima, Peru

27) The Lotus Demons’ Lair
(The Lotus Demon of Mercury)

Lo, the toiling sun spins
Above the roof of his den,
Above the Great Volcanic Crater
Of Mercury—where
The Lotus Demons live.

With unshadowed images,
Spun in the friendless deep,
As fate would have it, none,
None who enter—escape.

April 13 2004, Lima, Peru

28) Earshot

The FBI was after him
(So he claims)
Fearful of Castro
(If not everything)

No money for taxes
Living in a drunken stupor
Trying to finish a manuscript
(“A Moveable Feast”)
Allusions to suicide
Blood pressure going high

No doctors please
He cried
(The Mayo Clinic nearby)

Suicide scenario
Depression took
His soul and character

He bought death with
Consuming drinks
He even conned himself
(I think)

Violently angry
Pinned in blame
For an insane life
He tried to lead

From Paris to Cuba
To Ketchum he was
Was he an old man lost
Lost at sea

Hemingway
Shotgun in hand with
His big-toe pulled
The trigger very slowly
And off flew his cranium

March, 2004

Note: considered for an award; also, reviewed by Barns and Noble, Poetry Review [competition], Rossville, Minnesota.

29) House without Windows

I am building a house with no windows
And a very small door,
And my friends all ask me why.

Life has been for me full of anxiety—
And I care not to let it in any more;
So you see, I am making a very small door.

And having no windows allows
What is outside not to look in—
Thus freeing my spirit to rest again….

Note: published in the Magazine: The Mango Tree, out of India [August/September, 2004]

30) Armageddon’s Hecatomb

Know ye that His kingdom shall come—
In days hence, thy days shall be gone
(I like former dust: dayless,
Speaking from chambers long gone)—
From Hell to Earth the demons come
(A tinge of gladness in their songs)—
Thou shalt live to see them.

Lo—a great army from the north
Cometh, cometh, in full force;
Soon, sword and flesh shall shortly meet:
On the field of Armageddon.

Quoth the Demon of the Pit, “Alas!”;
For, upon the Throne of Earth,
He whose Horse is White sitteth
And biddeth farewell,
As doth ebb the realm of hell.

31) Armageddon’s Incubus

In Europe, the enchantress sculpts—
From earth to hell—peculiar spells,
Makes a changing world ebb.

From within her sphere’s crystal gaze—
Dark shadows, blood-soaked graves,
Molded steps that lead to nowhere,

Time’s phantoms—
All of whom are tyrannous—
Walk up and down these eldritch stairs,

Waiting to call together iron forces:
The architects of war.
Unremitting silence masks the globe

Of mortal woes and secrets told;
And now that wisdom’s turned about,
Draws forth Abyssal demon-cults

(All mobilized, coming to life).
Funerals, pendulums, brutality:
It’s all part of what must be.

32) Nightmare

He lives within the deep
Where others never sleep—
Monstrous fathoms below,
Where lava rivers flow,
And crowding waters rush.

He is the nightmare demon
With a flat, untraversable form—
Lying in a bottomless tomb,
Undoomed, haply awakened,
Awaiting slumber.

Note: This poem was inspired by the Clark Ashton Smith’s picture,’ Nightmare’, and was written right after the purchase of the original picture from Tom Strausky, who purchased it through G. de la Ree, circa l980; at which time the picture was named.

33) Glossary of End Times

Four
Horses
Running wild
Hoof beats awaken
The hungry and sleeping world
Waiting for the seventh trumpet
Angels are in the winds
Hail and fire and blood
Burning mountains
Falling

Birth pangs
And three woes
The Seventh Trumpets
The Seven Bowls
The Seven Seals
False Prophet
The Dragon
The Beast
Anti-

Christ
Takes the
Place of
Christ