poems by owen lucas

Fossil fugues of torn words spit, drool sideways
from the burning mouth of the aching schizophrenic prophet,
whose feet drag in dust, whose palms are turned up
in supplication to the merciless sky, as peasants watch.

In dusty tenements, box rooms at the end of days,
rabid whore-children scratch and tear the walls
apart, break their cages, run and flash blind anger
through the dusk, their savage cries echo through the halls.

Limpid in forgotten shacks of toothpick towns,
in phosphorescent tubes of buzzing liquid light
wait pupae, larvae of the perfect beat electric,
quivering in fluid and growing slowly in the night.