[Pray high, sinners]

Pray high, sinners. Take the pills and parcel them

out amongst the lot of you. Find forgiveness

in the lighter head, the warmer numb.

Ask our lord for a hand and he’ll shake us

clean. I died for you one time, but never again.

Lift lines like lifting spirits – we live in heaven now.

At least we think this is where we are. Darker

than originally imagined, louder than the place

we came from. Our fathers said this will pass

and we don’t believe them worth a bit of salt.

We’re worth a bit of salt. A bit of sound, quiet

or otherwise – good men know where they are.

We are not good men. We are the big-eyed bugs

who can’t see the future. Who are built to ruin

moviesets and pretty girls crying in their homes.

Eighteen eyes, eighteen drinks in, we can’t see

eighteen inches before us. Damned by our loves.

Silly rabbits – they thought we’d scatter when the lights came on.

Untitled, May 5

Hell used to be further away than the front door

and I can only recall the better lines.

A heart of black gold –

there was a beating to it

once, but the mass

it don’t breathe no more. I want to dig a hole in the world

only to find someone

has done it

before. Baby, defeat me.

There was a desire once, and pure thoughts.

Noble action. A truth that would

burn itself at the stake. Truth like a kiss

like a rock.

Kiss like a rock. Now we kiss like rocks kiss.

She found a strange sweetness in my mouth once,

a taste greater than the smoke.

            More saccharine than the tinny blood

            the sink finds each morning now.

I filled the lungs and the hole. I burned the truth, burned the sugar off.

I learned a lesson once,

            quickly learned to kill:

Killed a heart and it turned black.

Killed a girl and she kissed me back.

Kissed me ‘til the cows came home.

Kissed me ‘til her stop came up.