Pauper, the Next

What is this I see before me?
Hell in all its glory...

Death.
Die.
Pass into emblem of state,
no file await the Hollywood
this time.
No Nightingale lines the larynx.
Not for you
flashpoint God
Of yellow lines and slender tantrum.

Adore today
adieu today,
but not the night
when you silently pass
(without fanfare)
into the It,
the What.
Whatever.
Bone broke
Thomas with green,
brackets with sulphur.
Click boxes
and the bait men would raise
and seethe...

©Steven Francis poems 2013

The Grave Mischief of Lady Betty

Bloodthirsty Bet what have you done?
The stranger dead
your only son.

Taught him money was warm as gin,
and greed it was
that put a blade in him.

Time passed slowly in Roscommon gaol
fearing the scaffolds shadow
and hemp pigtail.

She was not alone on her final night,
and all condemned
cursed the morning light.

On the chosen day no hangman came,
but Death was eager
so upped the game.

As Bet stepped onto the gallows cloud
she removed the noose
and said aloud;

'Spare my neck and i'll hang the others!'
And so it was,
she swung her convict brothers.

No souls it seemed could quench fair Bet,
the Irish bloodhound
children won't forget...

© Steven Francis poems 2009

Six Times As Much As Six

Oh where for thou art!
Cavort through metal stalks
toward adder throated kings
laying lower than a baptist.
Daughter of a bamboo bruise,
the hunt six six six,
for birch bodied kettle teens
who hark for cadaver lined strumpets,
toppling on their bayonet heels
and hitching up their wolves for howling.

God rest the mission 666;
wake digital spells unto homebrews.
march gator heads to their hernias
to hernias in shadows
where domed headed children
lurk below as punks.
Always beneath
the simmering blast of summer
blinds a devil's eye
and bands of saturated flesh
seep death sauce to its hunter...

©Steven Francis poems 2013