Joke Moon

If the throne of a city is struck
By the butcher and the baker
And the candlestick maker
If the beggars are horseless
Numberless still
Pointing as high as the moons

If the dumb and the deaf
Are seen in a city
The locusts are spinning
In the curtains and in the dust
And the tip of your tail is behind your eyes
And under your smiles

The rivers are gathered
Covered with clouds
If the floorplan and structure
And her statues are signless
And the swallows cease singing in front of the flock
If it rains razors, and murders, and slaughters

If the Saint Fox is crowded
And crowned by a blow
If the codes in the stars
Are the codes in your arms
And the number you wear is formed like a wheel
The kite and the eagle
And the crop and the drop

And the notes in the depths
And in the dance of your breath
Are seen in a city set upon a hill
Sulfur and ebony, tamarisk and clay
And the city is sliding, moving like dogs' teeth

And the Moon had moved back-crack
Beyond the eyes of the gods
Forest and trust and glut
And carnival; a glove
On a snake in the cracked crown
At the wake the Sun is dust
And the bronze and the gold

And the summer Sun
Turns sketches of scribbles
It's a river of words carrying deserts and shutters
And a bowl full of spells
Move your eyes from the gaze
The Moon is dead now, Joke Moon

The rabbit and hare in the Martyr Face
By trap and snare and man
"Now kill them all", says Peter Pan