Run
REMINGTON GRAVES
Close your eyes. Can you hear the night outside screaming your name in faint whisper–from somewhere behind a billion exploding stars. Where hidden murmurs tremble the cold still. Planets spin slowly and silently reserved and partially prurient–but not as we are, in their divine arrogance dormant and whirring like massive gears turning and doing an unappreciated job.
Inhale deeply. Allow the rust of a million machines to sing to you, O death, and the demise you are. Humming and cymballing like falling pebbles on a brass countenance, an Egyptian sweaty fever dream atop a pyramid while beetles cook far down below in the indignation of an ancient sun. Our creations die without complaint, and it pains the brain to miss the point. Perhaps we have created better versions of ourselves.
Now, with a soft exhale, bite into your lower lip…hard…now harder. No–keep biting. Harder still. Break the skin…there. Taste the blood, the river Styx, the iron stream, the scarlet ribbon that ruins the certain skepticism married to any form of sanctity. If a mirror be near you, approach it and smile. Nestled in your teeth, there amid the row of tiny walls, where soldiers squeeze right through and crawl above each other in hope, of their own Helen.
You see walls around you, in the very spot where albino peacocks stood still, and men murdered muses, soft weapons didn’t see the sun, the zest was yet to be born that rode the zephyr calmly, and babies were bludgeoned for a chance, if a mere one, to be heard by gods created–in wood, in mud, in stone, in crowds or the madness of the alone.
Run. Run. Run.
To home, to turn to stone, to fall within the fault, and crushed by a behemoth pillar of salt, to fuck the angels inside, to let our daughters drain you with drink, to outgrow old clothes, to feel pain from simply waking up…
Run. Run. Run.
∞
A Man After My Own Heart
REMINGTON GRAVES
Light slithered in through the spaces, glaring through like slow shattering glass, swallowing the shadows and severing the stillness. Cavernous echoes conquered the perfect silence, causing a chasm betwixt confusion–correcting errors once despised, reverberating the recalcitrant stares inside the windows of a coffee house sidewinding with snakes; the emptiness expanded as glaring tiny screens pacified the creatures once mistaken for people. Their talons taunted my soft, pink flesh. Small rectangled tables riddled the building and shifted from one wall to the other–seating the reptiles to their rancid feast.
The pungent stench from heavy breathing–salivating and repugnant mouths ajar, filled the spot and sent my eyes searching for the exit whilst , as much as I possible could under a sweaty brow, conceal my terror. The vile vermin snarled and reached for one another, locking tongues lasciviously, shlopping amid scraping sounds of jagged teeth. Boxes and cups fell from the shelf all designed with minimalist ideas of art concocted to appeal to the cockeyed masses. I haven’t tried that brand of coffee, I don’t think, I thought as the empty packages pummeled to the ground.
“Your drink looks tasty,” one of them said with a ten inch tongue dripping across the table in which we sat.
“It is,” I replied with a difficult swallow, “would you like a drink? I don’t need to finish it. Truly, I want you to have it.” The heart, I thought–If I could take a shard of glass and pierce him right in the heart!
“No, that’s quite all right, son. You enjoy, okay.”
“Is it okay if I leave?” I belted after some hesitation.
“Why are you asking me? Are you sure you’re okay? You’re looking a little peeked, now that I’m taking a closer look. Maybe you should call someone to come and pick you up, bud. Got any friends you can call?”
“I thought I had some. Maybe.”
“Well, where are they now?”
“They all turned out to be reptiles. Shit–sorry.”
“Oh, sheesh, we’re not all bad, for crying out loud. Hell, let me buy you another drink…I recommend you get it with steamed blood this time. It’s to die for.”
“Well, I could give that a shot, I think. I should live a little.”
“It’s tough at first, I know. Believe me, it gets easier.”
“I hope so, ” I said reclining and wiping the sweat from my brow.
“I promise, I used to be just like you…then I simply gave in. Nobody wants a trouble-maker you know.”
“Yeah, I guess so. I’ll take that drink now–extra hot.”
“Atta boy…man after my own heart.”
∞
Ending Pending
REMINGTON GRAVES
Inclined was the cursory, of a stare opposed–contrived with constant echoing whilst fainting and bleeding as bending lyres behind you in Hades did wrought a dreamt-of your undoing
And those walls were soft–from the corridors that let the light in. Ever so soft and wet to the touch, adorned in the dark with roses weeping le sang de un poet: the tears of the bastard child chasing the perfect line; fingers dragging along, a pliable, silky smooth paneling, and from behind, she calls out
she calls out a name
endless…….nameless
she utters with desperation in her choking, drowning lungs
ahead the many headless statues maxims martyred one and all
to ward off witches to sing and to pleasantly enthrall
devoid of virtue and swarmed by roaches bearing lofty titles so banal
And past the catacombs
the scurrying that now spells home
the smell of dying roses the splendor of broken bones
the dreaming of the iron thrones of a sinking belle that rather die alone
On the way the Oculi twin occluded trembling with tenor, plucked harpsichord in wailing, and with the fall came the whim of the whilom–broken back and shivering scenarios of black and light –animus sumina
afflatus furtive banging a cold hammer against ice
sparking embers traces for the travelers atop horses long dead now but crying for the deicide
beating drums of revenants never once remembered
bruised behemoth haughty thence now harrowing
art thou the same that slayed the saints without a moment’s hesitation?
Almost out and through. In sight I saw the sun, I must confess, I uttered her name in return without a single pause and mortal reservation
ending…….pending
∞
War Commandments
REMINGTON GRAVES
“Hello, friend, have you got the time?” said a young fellow with dingy Dockers on and gripping his leather-bound bible under is starched long sleeve.
“It’s about a quarter past seven,” I said slouching on the bench and watching the water fountain that flowed in the middle of the mall.
“Thank you. I’m Moses, nice to meet you.”
“Sorry to hear that–my name is Ade.”
“Sorry for what?”
“Your name is Moses, you were named after a war criminal–amongst other things.”
“I was named after the Moses in the Bible, buddy.”
“Yes, I know.”
“He was a holy man.”
“I hate to ask what you consider an unholy man.”
“I don’t think–”
“Moses is the crazy character who laid down the Ten Commandments. By today’s standards, your pal would be considered guilty of horrendous war crimes.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Really? In the book of Numbers, the “lord” orders Moses to raise an army to attack Midian to punish the people there. He raises twelve-thousand soldiers fucked up the place proper, killed the kings and left with their victorious spoils.”
“Oh, that has happened all the time all over the world throughout history. It’s still happening today. Are you sure it’s in the Old Testament?”
“Positive. And that may be true, but you did call him a ‘holy man.'”
“Well, then…I’m sure there was a good reason. Besides that doesn’t seem so bad.”
“No? Your pall Moshe became furious with all who returned from the war and asked them, ‘Why have you kept all the women alive? Do ye not remember that it was the women who followed Balaam’s instructions and at Peor led the people to be unfaithful to the Lord. That was what brought the epidemic on the Lord’s people. So now kill every boy and kill every woman who has had sexual intercourse but keep alive for yourselves all the girls and all the women who are virgins.'”
“Listen, buddy, I gotta go,” he said perking up in his penny loafers.
“You gotta go, or you gotta go back into your little hole where you’re comfortable not knowing the truth about your faith?”
“That can’t be true. Where in the Bible does it say that?” he said with a challenging tone.
“Book of Numbers. Chapter thirty-something.”
“That seems like an isolated case, maybe. And Moses was a–”
“A holy man, I know. It may seem unreasonable to apply our modern standards to Moses, even though its okay to apply biblical standards to our lives today. In Biblical warfare, capturing of virgins and killing of male children was pretty typical.”
“Are you sure he didn’t do that a couple of times? Maybe it happens once.”
“Well, I’d have to question your sanity if you mean you give your buddy The Moshinator a pass if he only committed that atrocity once. What would you do if i took your virgin sister, killed your family and took your shit because you didn’t believe in what I believe. In reality, there are other instances: Judges, for example, chapter nineteen or twenty, I can’t recall. The Israeli soldiers were sent out by the assembly with orders to “Kill all the males and also every woman who is not a virgin. They returned with four-hundred virgins to give to the men of the tribe of Benjamin. That number came up short by half, mysteriously enough. The assembly gave the Benjaminites this advice: “Go and hide in the vineyards and watch. When the girls of Shiloh come out to dance during the feast, you come out of the vineyards. Each of you take a wife by force from among the girls.”
He tilted his head back in defeat and exhaled so profoundly that I could hear his pain, and I heard the unholy ghost leave him. The Bible fell to the side of the bench where we were perched and he didn’t seem to care. I was tempted to regret the hand I had in his apparent horror, but he asked for it. It made me wonder how I would feel if I was named after a killer and a rapist.
And we sat there quietly and still while staring at the water fountain as it flowed as the sound of children echoed inside the mall filling the place like a song of purity and innocence.
∞
Grey Wolves
REMINGTON GRAVES
It was a natural and endless barrage of blistering thoughts that nuanced at the natural order of the throes that followed; the heat rampaged at my cool exterior and infiltrated the throne room where wolves snarled with gleaming eyes in the dark, and then finally laid down in acquiescence; my hands quivered in the throbbing quiet of the calm; lips endured the sinking bite of jagged teeth; the heart palpitated frenzied and furious…
Out the window, I beheld a couple staring at each other under a blistering sun. Screams ensued and sulking followed. Sweaty countenances coincided splendidly. Their grubby garb left good hygiene and a paying job to be desired. And yet, in that tumultuous wrangle, I found myself covetous of their trivial tiff. With what ailments they contended, and passions no longer pretended, they crawled like creatures creating a world of chaos–unaffected by the man behind the shielding pane. I felt absurd as my designer watch reflected the sun in my eyes, reminding me of the blinding spell of the things we own and how they end up owning us.
After a few minutes, the swallowing madness–what I call my anxiety ( which if I don’t put in check, ends up becoming a terrible and crippling panic attack) waned before it waxed. Exhaling like a Hindu cow and inhaling like a slumbering sloth, I sagged in my seat and feigned composure. Standing up and honing in on the menu on the wall, I convinced myself that some new tea shit infusion was in vogue, hence must be good. Oh, the power of Capitalism, I thought as I snapped my neck to the right trying to crack it with no avail.
After a few pensive moments, I took another seat in a different part of the coffee shop, to avoid the scene outside no doubt, and pulled out my writing apparatus.
With a few sips of the trendy tea, I began to feel myself again…I felt planted on the ground and told myself that adulthood must be comfortable and free of danger–free of strife. That I didn’t sell out, I simply cashed in.
And right before a smile crept upon my face, a Sheriff came in and sat next to.
“How ya doin, guy?” He asked taking out his lap top with a smile. He gave me a goofy, glazed-eyed wink and sipped on his drink.
I felt my jaws tightening up and the grey wolf in me, with the rest of the pack, which I call my dispositions, stood up and closed in.
∞