Death Versus Hero

I am a dying man
in a dead world,
and as I lay here
curled amongst medicine and psalms,
veins like a flowered hell,
I watch a tiny hero on film
bring more death.
It never ends.
We all want more Black.
It rocks.

I watch guns and comedy,
men throttled with steel cables
or lanced by stockinged crows.
I will follow soon
to blood, tear and fables,
'tho mine will not dry
but fall with the credits.
I live in hope for a muscled legend...

@Steven Francis poems 2008

Sabre Tooth Sky

Today was not for dying.
No shadow man or beast
gained a drop of blood,
no rigid varnish stained a soul.
Death forgotten in Death,
this day was not for dying.

Rest now in your Lavender bed,
untouched by hooded lights.
Settle like a cwtch
and shake away the peppered bone
that chains us to our sin and sorrow.
The dangerous art of life
left far behind.
Today was not for dying.

Turn from blackening.
The raven has no calling
to your song,
no red in blood or coals
have purchase on your ghost.
Step quickly into Saphire fields,
this day was not for dying.

A greater part of Love
again sheds its mad flesh,
dropping muscled furies like ancors
into a gentle froth.
Smile from your scrolled seat
as serpents and sores are banished
to mortal print.
Death was never near.
Today was not for dying...

@Steven Francis Poems 2008


For my Mother, Susan Francis

Life has never been Lived as full as yours.
There is no End , life Lives on...

There's Not Much Difference Between Ink and Bile

I feel like Cocaine
headbutting tables
like a thrilled chicken.
Life is super behind these eyelids
a real circus.
Holy Land
in the tomb on my shoulders.

Call me Angel
a fountain of Love,
pissing diamond miracles
for dimes and nobodies.
There's no colour here,
no bandit ways to stain my glass.
My heart is pure
my teeth sharp.
In my goodly drunk paradise
heroes are loved
but the worm is King.

Let pass the wolf people
in their search for Hollywood,
with minds cheap
like caramel sunsets.
Vacant gargoyles in a spin!
Come to me through Dirt
and backstreet needles,
paint nothing on your lips.
Save judgement for the sober
and hell for hangovers.

We Mad, the real Mad
follow bull queens
to the altar of Skulls like poisoned dogs
running toward Oblivion.
Drugged, bullied, maimed.
Burning paper walls
to visit Triumph.
People on medicine
always need perversions,
a sister to disaster.
In God we trust,
bury us on Good days...

@Steven Francis Poetry 2008

Tafod I'r Nefoedd

Into the green assault
we go,
beyond all glass machines
and graves.
A giant tongue
studded with eyes and ember
takes the lion home.

Here rise valleys
screamingup toward leopard skies,
lifting out of needle towns,
pulling monsters from the dead.
Great coffins
hold honey comas,
a homely retreat.

Young Colossus,
stand fierce
above the lime wasteland.
Be safe
from war and angry crowds.
Unite the tides,
stone and cloud our strength...

@ Steven Francis Poetry 2008