When I Was Tame

Some knew me before the hell ignited
in times before oceans seethed,
the dragon slept in its molten nest
while a gentler boyo breathed.

T'was there I walked in cushioned cysts
no whisky flamed these cheeks,
before glass and bolt descended
like crews of bandaged freaks.

My fists as calm as jellyfish
slapped on buttered thighs,
my skull fried storms a millpond
asleep behind virgin eyes.

Neither hurricane or gallows tune
creased this sober frame,
both fang and c**k stayed holstered
remembering I was tame.

Long nights were safe from phantom
and feral deathly hounds,
and mornings brought no iron grave,
no oubliette in the ground.

But mad frost fell upon sanctuary
and horns grew from the child,
both lambs and chicks lay scalded
from the halo of the wild...

@Steven Francis poems 2011

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

Tricia Poe

Aimless we walk the clown candy neon bars
drenched by rain and bourbon,
through deathly pastures
where gulls form choirs of ragged poets
in the throat of night.

A raven audience
of spit and blades!
Strike my apparent iron ballad,
step gently into a valentine dance...

@ Steven francis poems 2011

Buzzes and Spikes (To Yonder Dales)

Love is all you need.

On scabbed paws,
love makes everything go away.

You are never alone with Love,
the master skin.

I Love beer.
And fish & chips.
Ginger headed damsels
in furies for the eagles.

Love is the batter
the rolling meadows,
song of oak
and woolen ministries.

The world beyond the clotted tendrils
is Love...

@Steven Francis poems 2011

Phantom Carousel

Circling above the crib in plumes of calm;
a hawk, but not of beak nor talon soars
crying sonnets from a nettle raspy throat.
The king phantom,
a ghostly touch and ode to the ivisible;
corpse shavings
rammed into sweet shells and smothered
into wafer horses.
Hold back those lily crisp creases
and kneel before a song of ages,
the death pages toll their eternal winds...

@Steven Francis poems 2011

Where Do You Wait?

Where do you wait, Mr Postlethwaite?
As you shake the dust from this world away.
Are you striding the gallant boards
and enthralling the saintly hoardes?
Are you drinking with Burton?
Have you still got your shirt on?
And do wings stick out from your clothes?

@Steven Francis poems 2011

In Memory of Pete Postlethwaite OBE

Ton Dernier Acte

When I am gone, distant from this green and woody earth
remember to leave tears from any eulogies ~
they are kind but never needed
for I am in a kingdom no mouth shaped love can touch.
I am not laden with ageing flesh and cataracts,
nor feel tender pain through gums and fingertips.
The hand-me-downs have left my heel
like eels in lather;
cigar smoke breaking free from rats on a leash
and there the tides meet coral raptures.
The hands strike for armageddon,
slapping for the breaking of human chains.

@Steven Francis poems 2011