The Furnace Fields

As I close my eyes at troubled times
I am welcomed back to the Furnace fields,
that holy land
where wood fell over itself to be wood
and wild was the beauty like fires over California.
Furnace fields!, live long inside my dreadlocked mind,
grow snakes and newts in crispy ferns
to guard against the wretched clock.
Offer me a pond so that I may sink into oblivion,
flushing tyres and telephones from a plastic bowel;
bury me oh mighty field
let my siren be quiet within those fishy roots...

@ Steven Francis poems 2011

I Wish They Could Have Died Like That

No scabs or suffocation
no gunshots nor burning,
I wish they could have died like that.
Without fear and pain
just a jab to the vein,
and a line on a screen going flat.

But there was hurt plenty
along with terror and blood,
when evil took my sunshine away.
No priest at the side
as they suffered and died,
no pillow to soften where they lay.

No horror or slashing
no drowning and beating,
I wish they could have died like that.
With a final feast
without monstrous beast,
and thy loved ones hearts not flat.

Alas the worlds without reason
this earth has gone mad,
and the devil looks after his kin.
For the innocents lost
we forget like the frost,
yet sinners die easy for their sins.

@ Steven Francis poems 2011

I will never forget you.

Postcard from a Route Home

To visit the alehouse on Sabbath Day
and be among wenches who swirl and play;
but on the road home, have a care
somebody follows, something is there.

Look to the left, an apparition appears
most foul and dreadful to molest thy fears;
at first a man with a sickly smile
who turns into mastiff for half a mile.

Onward go with the dog beside,
a diabolic companion from sulphuric tides.
Then just as quick it does retire
the hound transforms into a raging fire.

Homeward path now edged with flame
know the devil, know his game;
strike your key into a shivering lock,
beware the saints which outside knock...

@Steven Francis poems 2011

No Gates for Angels

And all beneath the marble throat,
under knees of blackened fists
are rats and lint cadavers.
Begin and end in burial
in slick earth;
a shelf of grit and worm,
to fester and turn mad in breaths
as days fold into months then years,
skinning organs in nasty hives.
The dead in kicks of hurried heels,
forgotten in their boneless sleep...

@ Steven Francis poems 2011

Swordfish Template

I break everything I touch,
everything I touch breaks;
I rip legs from spiders because I am cruel
I break hearts of girls by loving them all.

Steel and smoke
or razors and rain.
Everything I touch breaks,
I break everything I touch.

I whistle bull sonatas at thin glass to hear it shatter,
and deliver honesty in wicked deliverance.
Curdling cherished memories into goose pimpled skin
to slice them like ham, to shred.

Grant skills to dig the soil in earnest
from fevers and convulsion;
the hybrids blow ghosts into velvet devils
kid corpses meet zombie farms.

I break everything I touch,
everything I touch breaks.
I eat hearts because I love life so much,
I crush snails because I love death...

@ Steven Francis poems 2011

Tail Whipped

Was that monsieur Death I felt around my collar?
Attempting to sneak up behind the grease and spit
of the wineless glass?
Was that thief Death I saw?
Herr Black, skulking in the wings
waiting to toss me into raven pits.
A dark fist swirling like a bee
in hope for honey marrow in my mucas brain,
as I stumble to doors of tranquility on my wet lips.
Lead on skull man,
to bats and lunar doors lead on...

@ Steven Francis poems 2011

Vasa Deferentia

All giddy tags
those skinny bubbles of lycra air,
clinking together like lobster jaws
toasting another thin regime.
The popes and charmers love it!
Milk skinned head butts into plastic cupped lanterns,
lights to herald the silk fronted skin slaps...

@Steven Francis poems 2011