Kurzschluß

So short the accidents and beds,
blood of ills and cruel stabs
from hellish crazies;
so short the brittle walks and dances
of wolf and man in need.

In life already short of breath
the bandits are the force which shuttle lungs
further into spectre clutches.
Our dragon dawn hoisted
onto the mortal sails of birth.

Sick are the coils of spirits
and even more the root that lives;
but a kinder machine with immortal percussions
would not be kind at all.

Pinch the fat from bony desert trinkets!
Settle the jam on greying sands
while beggars at the rotten feast
kneel before tumour jars,
as hearts are loved and burned.

Eager fizzy broths of cancer
bringing messy scars to boil
while rabid horses stamp out time.
Short, too short
these velvet twists of fog
corroding the defiant springs of youth...

@Steven Francis poems 2011