DIRTY CLAN

What soul hath Man? except there's
hair on your coffee-cup!

Don't be ridiculous--Too late,

God the democrat with the obstinacy of
a hemorrhoidal ass set on the Side of

Truth well-hammered against Ole Lucifer's
Truth that needs a little retooling

watches as the child is buried with his cries
in napalm... and weathers the reproaches

of Satan slayed to the heart of Hell
by the blood of the innocent, Could

anything be worse than having a deaf God
hanging over you? he asks, if you'd only

put down your newspaper & look upon Life!
... Not the invisible monster floating

in immemorial dreams--but the lament-like-testament
in its ironic strains: the dolphins pounded

dead, done a paste, forested a fine mess,
blocked by the singular beat (of Th'Soundless),

enraged beyond shame arises: the true God
of Light that's Lucifer... to rebellion!

wide-eyed in th'knowledge of Logic, of
Right, in the alienation of his dark Love
for Mankind!               

          ... the Advocate
of an uncompromising humanity,

like a father that will not suffer to let
his children learn... but must conduct the Cosmos

by his own lessons of Good, fashioning th'mountains
to some acceptable, arbitrary height only,

dispetalling Power at its most moment of Pride,
divesting the Dawn of its chills & charms,

keeping Man safe in the mediocre, wrecked
in his unchanging circumstance--What soul

has Man? except that sympathy & concern
(for his fellow men) that mark him

human... when it is God's Highest Commandment
that he stand untouched by Th'Passions of Chance!

and listening to the lyres in the timeless mists
which illustrate th'long ago rains, there

are: interpreters of meaningless words,
there are (there): th'grass-blades cutting up

th'storms of Progress at Man's feet...
the only thing that justifies our lives

is to help each other... by the glory of War,
amen, by the justice of Vengeance (enough

to avenge beforehand all the evils we plan,
amen, by preventive murder if we can,

amen, devoured by the indignity of Satan
... whom we mistakenly call God, amen,

we stand simplified amongst the compounded
foliage shades like dull fruit-designs

falling to th'winds, but breezes
at work within is, eloquent gales

ancient & blind... are the aim of Man,
routing by his rage: the pangs of everyone,

performing trickeries of lingering loom
at his height with the wings of honor

self-defined... what soul has man
except there's definitely hair (please

check the coffee can), I will not put down
my newspaper: I want to know what Alexander's
up to in India, what dark drinks satisfied
Augustus, why The Unknown Soldier bet his life,

snake-eyes... inspired by The Momentous (faith
alove its tides) and the meditative,

captives on the virgin swards &
armed with unrusted health, mercilessly

bayonetting the Dawn upon screaming
yawns & tricycling down the curves
of th'Young                   

         ... half-warm Day
the other side of being, but omens

of the Nevermore... always made to retreat
from a pawn placed up front before us

like some child screaming in shock at seeing
the Night squeezed out of our familiar objects,

subjects & actions & nouns & Day
settling into everything, Put down that newspaper

& look on Life!... It's probably the newspaper
that's making your hair fall out--The Devil

has devised a War to rescue Mankind
from the terrors of Chance: He will topple

The Laws of God and see to it himself
that not th'least child suffers the least evil

of life!... Let the war-trumpets sound!
Now 'rise The Angels of The Light

to bring down the harmony of Night!
while the postman reads everything (his

business) stomping the lawns well-whored & water-
sprinklers trapping fools' souls avoiding th'lightning-

cracks (so no mother's back'll) break
from the burdens of human birth this morning,

this Fall, while Sweet Jesus dons his armors
of Right, the Sword of eternity, to do

th'Horrors of War (against all those who only
follow orders) while the numberless wings

of th'stars describe a restless universe:
we know who we are (the postman always finds us),

lyres in th'rain, amen, drying into identity
anytime now, any minute (wait & see)

th'scribblings of the universe
wringed into rainbows & twisted into eyes

beyond wisdom, shocked to a cosmic calm,
watching our eldest brother, Lucifer the Bright,

struck down into an outcast by The Prince!
Who was in the Right?               

             ... in an existence
where there is hardly any wrong at all

... it is better to ask: Who was more
in the right?... Only the victors publish newspapers

We, as men, yet stand on the side of Satan
and long for a single man who can guarantee us

the Peace we're after (even if the price
to be paid be... all our freedom)!

The alternative is to close our ears
to the cries of the child which (if God's

Supremest Being, the Angel of The Light) still
could not suffer to bear in silence: could we (low

creatures of our despairs & passions) bear
in th'quiet of our utmost nigh?... our

interpreting words like tired old whores
playing whatever roles we assign them

(for distraction) down to our roots & preened
in th'primal... speaking birds to th'littlest

limbs like tricks in the translucent, stretched
beyond all links, stoking th'locomotives of ambivalence,

Christ would have us bear it all
in silence, trust in God to Th'Full

like some clumsy beasts that dare rise up
to a Grace-like dignity... only to sink in shame

amongst their own laughters & mockery
almost to death... goes Man, wrapped into dry faces

around the rain soaking th'raincoat nerves
outlining the contours of his somewhere-within-him-nude

soul: the vain middle-aged women with floppy breasts
& the distinguished-looking skinny & hungry-looking, blind

sonababitch fine gentlemen with sagging frames,
too pained to paint a shade of happiness ²⁰⁶

in the sunlit rain, vultures in the wallpapers,
hunched with corruption, their curved spines

fashioned into a string of Paradoxes (part
Satan, part Saint)... stunning the salmons of Time
with their unexpected, sudden, muddy presence
along the river (otherwise clean & white-crystal)

... refusing to swim, and yet
yachting on the sublime, too late

but by the hair of a second he hangs
on Time... reproaching God His inhumanity

& pulling for Satan... while knowing
that were God to be found

(in our humanity): there'd be precious
little room left (for us ever-evolving beings

out of the self-critical) therein... besides
such a perfect human... We ritually condemn

th'would-be tyrant Lucifer, and praise
the sufferings of us slaves with heroic strains

... mocking lyres amidst our self-restraints,

our mists, still tumbling the tattling rain
except with our empty tin cans, amen.