idgonemad.net/communication/words/irgendwahn


_irgendwahn
by : gadiv
device : free verse with increasingly numerous lines peaking at thirteen in the thirteenth stanza, then diminishing
describe : Be warned! Possibly delusion! All text links to images from the actual, physical art book based on this poem, and will open in their own new windows.

I could hear the pavement screaming

the honeybees have stopped making honey
in lieu of making glue

I had a horse that I used to ride
come winter we had to put it down
for kindling

she tastes like exotic oils from the far ends of
a gun's barrel
peppered with flash burns
tiara pinned to her curls

somewhere a grown man mumbles
he asks a woman for change
and grinds his teeth as
she walks away, he shuffles his feet
and waits for the next

three young boys make their move
to the window sill
and abscond with another pie
behind the window, under the sink
they are promised this one will be the last
with a jar of arsenic

such a stiff white collar
such a stiff white member
of the clergy
they say Sodom burned for the sort of things
this priest of fools
does to little boys' mouths
he breaks his own rules

the insight one can glean
from the workings of the copying machine
pristine original caught in the light
is never surpassed in quality
by the copy
such is also the way of humans
who continue to compare poorly in substance
against their predecessors

faces from my childhood
sometimes visit my brains
sometimes mix up their names
but are always understood
I remember every face
and a few hairstyles for each
I sometimes wonder how they are
then become fascinated at why
I would care at all

I'm best infested
with fleas majestic
when one is found
then one is downed
but two rise in its place to take up the fight
their tactics are clean and quick
their guerrilla warfare finds me unaware
they gnaw at my ankles
and I suspect a base of operations
somewhere within my bunny slippers

all the senses and senselessnesses
distress at the strain of a well-lit day
to always return to the burn of the sand
or the smart of the end of a hand raised
and moved against their faces impudent
they will poison the plowshares
they will turn the earth
they will turn the earth black and ash
the very air will sizzle with burning rain
the flesh will acquiesce to the rebuttal
the torrent of men torn to a trickle

behind those perfect blue-green eyes
between those slender, gartered thighs
silicone tongue against aluminum palate
she smiles smiles laden with lipstick lies
accommodating company as per her specifications
high heels and skirts and unbuttoned blouses
latex skin taut over a variably ideal figure
she is utterly enslaved to her design
this model's not intended for other use
this model's restrained and chained
she will know nothing more
than what her manufacturer will allow

a green-tiled bath
or a flying green abattoir
high above the sky,
we were standing over the clouds
looking down
a broken place peopled by shadows
without people
and there they sought us across the tiles
over the sky through the floor
and there we sought escape
clinging to wrought iron railing
desperately trying to keep
our own darknesses pure

that low-sodium loneliness
that turns today grey
and fuzzies tomorrows
like they were yesterdays
don't think I'm sorry for
all the pain that I've caused you
I was broken programmed into this way
and that is my true regret
we'll come back as puffins one time
but now I have fly wings to peel off of my eyelids
try to sit still
I adore my proximity to you but you know
I am also miles away

hastened to fasten the seatbelt
pursue the elusion of the pursuer
evading what dangers follow turns hollow
if basic safety is shirked in the flight
he chases us in a dark automobile
his mask more familiar a face than his face
driving an erratic heartbeat
in a place pretending to be Russia
until we flatline as the crow flies
a fateful syzygy of us
our murderous masked man-thing
and an unavoidable dead-end dead end

so far from a horse
and so warm with bourbon
facilitate my fortune
but not from the ground, by the pick
as the best deposits are well-known
I prospect from the dark
striking gold in the mouths of passersby
looting their claims
groans bubble up in a froth
a desperate bid
to sound the air with their alarm

vultures vulture the vulture
scavenging the scavenger
that lingered too long on the road
the scattered gluttonous thing
gutless and feather forlorn
tumbles by wind to the gutter
the lowliest of lovers make there their bed
in soon-time the bird thrives anew
birthing another generation
of the common housefly

made sure he was seen
owed a debt of respect
laid a hand to his shoulder
and stared into his open eyes
cloudy, tongue lawled to the side
like frosted glass over a black olive
I stared into those dead open eyes
and within mine eyes realized
why we close the eyes of our gone

I am ready to order
I'll have what the fat cow over there is eating
a glass of water with lemon
and a side of hormones to make my meat swell
please no brains or low grade grains
we know what happened in Europe
make me a burly bastard of a bull
and carve me into thin slices of Americana

sitting in the subway
fondling her scars
when her veins argue with her she puts them in their place
with razors and lit cigarettes
fondling her box cutter
an argument with the jugular
of the woman right beside her

his hallucinations are all natural
while hers are man-made manufactured
his breath smells of sewage
while she is sweeter than the pinkest parts of her
watermelon bubblegum
with the green kiwi center

the seahorse croons at dawn
his voice carried in the currents
over a chorus of seaponies in his manwomb
that attracts five delicious flavors
of predators

that upturned nose
resting against the wall in front of me
as if he alone can illuminate the darkness in the hearts
of lightbulbs

on the streets he will pursue her
and on the sheets she will accept him
and all it will take are the wiles of his wallet

an alarm signals the world's collapse
and the synapse snaps

may be closer than they appear

_____
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