Peck 'n Paw

I paint, I paint the world I see
Over and over, no pictures
Just colors, the drying palette's young
These cuts the airbrush cleans
I paint, my mind can't stand the blanks
I scrape my brushes clean
I seal sights like body bags
These fruiting bodies of our days of gangrene

Corvée at ease
Pose for relief against the wall
Mullholland Drive needs finger sheathes
To keep the American dream embalmed
Pronounced on leave
Port of Call, Color TV
The aquarium that can't spill over
The periscope that hides the rising sea

And the rubber-strapped rabbit's mask runs a fence around your teeth
And you pull at the snaring band
But it runs off your hands like mercury
Eyes are too small, I move by touch
And all I touch feels empty
I pass unseen

So it is with words, always chatter, chatter
Airwave noise in the cold, blue tinnitus verse
Like a battered child, I piss them out in my clothes
Staring blankly ahead and shivering
The rock salt tears my paper skin
Splashes me red, the backdraft wind
Stoking the burning bridge
The wound's infected dressing closing in

Empty the clip
Empty the magazine
Between my eyes, a sucking wound
The emulsion wearing holes in me
Empty the clip
Rifle through the magazine
I cannot read the lines before me
Only watch them fly toward me, hissing

Watch my eyes, follow my lead
We're all actors in house seats
Curia turned gallery
Caesar-colored heads can't blink, turn or hide or even lie for they can't speak
Death mask hollow, white with maggots
Flood lights drown us one by one behind their teeth

Ascending, ascending all
What need have modern men forgiveness
A silent voyeur does no wrong
The holocaust the soft still voice demands
We carve out from each other's hands
And fan the growing fire so we can watch
Consummatum est
Into your eyes, I commend our loss