Category Archives: surrealism

Houses of the holy

‪Tired from rolling tires‬
‪uphill, but still…‬
‪Stunned by heart thump,‬
‪I’m sat flat, in the open garage,‬
‪on a summer chair,‬
‪watching chimney breaths‬
‪bellow and subside.‬
I’m thinking of all the real houses
fanned out in a matrix
on the slopes above me.
Their snowy rooves
with small ponds of molten black,
made by fickle bubbles of attic heat.
The houses, the rooves of snow,
and what floats above them.
And ah! What daydream!
One house is a piano house.
Children come and go there,
in clandestine cars,
to partake of the tuneful drug.
Their mother-teacher has piano teeth,
taut ham strings, and clockface glasses.
We met by accident.
She hit my car.
I keyed her piano.
We get along.

The way out

Cable-carried am I,
upslope,
in harness.
Slow. It is slow.
I hear the rollercoaster clacks,
each prophesying sinister thrills.
With powered eyes I see
continents of fogged-in secrets.
Sorry horses stand, bedraggled in streaming rains.
They look to me with pleading eyes,
but I have no help to give.
Clack, clack, clack…..a sharp turn.
The dream veils are dropped,
and it is bright cooking sun.
Beetles of football size float by with a helicopter buzz.
At my left hand, now, is a rail of brass.
From it hang leather pouches,
each containing an object of obscure purpose.
Now a can of grease.
Now a pair of winged sandals.
Sunglasses with upside-down arms.
I see now that my left hand holds a red stop button,
and I press it.
The rippling tinkle sound of a taut chain relaxing.
I do not wish to leave items that I might need,
but I don’t know what to take.
I pick up a red phone, hung from a post.
Its rotary dial says “phone a friend”.
I say hello.
Someone in a cackling voice says
“We are all mad here”, and hangs up.
I decide that the items in the pouches are false bait.
There’s a tin pedal at my foot,
like the ones in bumper cars.
I step on it, and move on.
My path drops away, suddenly downslope,
and I feel a release from the ratcheting chain.
I am speeding now, in full panic.
There are three rushing rivers at the end of my Zip line.
Within arms’ reach, there is a lever with three positions available.
I try it, but it does nothing yet.
There’s a brake pedal too, and I jam it as hard as I can.
I smell the smoking steel, memories of subways long ago.
Once more, I am at a crawl, coming to the end of the line and the rushing waters.
There is one last leather pouch.
It holds a pair of stout cutters, and I take them.
Out of track, now.
Feet dangling, I hang from an overhead derrick.
I try my lever again.
It moves me over the gateways of each water.
Cockeyed conifers point to the left hand way.
On a ledge, above the right hand river,
a rainy horse.
I shift the lever, then cut the cord.
The water is warm,
and oh so sleepy.

Skeletal

all the days of a life
in misery’s company
its dark bird upon the shoulder
visible to none but its host
but not in mirrors.
its hooks,
in the trapezius,
do not disturb much
unless rebellious thoughts foment.
it tells
what may say
what may think
what is self
until at last the Self cries
bring me the hydrogen winds of the bomb,
make vapour of my body
my love
and render my bones to the sun.

The Birth

so sleepy.
caresses with gloves of plush velvet.
and so, let me slide…
I fly over brooding lands of Origin.
my mast head turns to visions magnetic.

pieces of The Art, half seen.
rumors of stories ancient.
obscured, they tantalize.
they collect within me until I must pause to consider each.

as a bird, I alight, upon a branch of rusting iron.
and there do i give hot birth to the leaden egg.
marbled in its weight, it burns,
swirling, showing on its shell a hint of bright beginnings.

i wait only for the Word,
but confounded am i by the echoes of witless conversations.
theatrical in their urgency.
demented and demonic.
the Great Lie.

there is the sound of one hand clapping.

the falsity bursts into crackling embers, then full dark.

There is a bang.

***

Image credit: http://www.dinosaurus.puisto.com

27: Electric babyland (may offend)

I got lotsa babies in here she says to me.  Her voice comes from the ceiling, but I can see her lips move.  Yellow teeth.  No irises.  On the cracked linoleum floor she stands, in stained sweatpants and a T shirt that goes to her navel.  She shifts from one foot to the other, as if she needs to go to the bathroom.  She drums her fingers on her tight beachball belly.  Lots.  Inside here.  

No smile, though.  She looks angry, crazed.  I lie on the floor, bound and gagged, while stark Tesla trees of pale blue crackle and branch about the ceiling.  She kicks the side of my head with a bare foot, and, just before I black out again , I see her turn and walk down the hallway.  My swoon is only seconds, I think,  because I hear the sound of someone peeing.  Then a flush.

The slap of bare feet comes closer and she reenters my room, this time wearing only the T shirt.  She squats and bows her head, greasy hair dragging the floor.  There is no moaning or groaning as she gives obscene birth.  Only the repeated sounds eck, eck, eck.
Small wet things dangle and drop.  Sharp yellow teeth, no irises.  They tear at my restraints with piranha frenzy.  I gain my freedom, but am paralyzed in stiffness and horror as they set upon their unwilling mother and begin to eat.