the beast's nine-nippled revelation #2

each one of us is a god flicking

the butterflies off their own

translucent nipples.



each one staring through pink lenses

in assigned groups of nine-- the rest

of our lives encompassed and only

forty-five seconds to live it all.

our eyes dilate, but we're not sure

why we're hyperventilating and

spittin' sweat on one of the

beast's nine glass nipples.



and we're butterflies

with a gut-busting instinct

to hit and be pinned on another

god's wall.







A soldier


I can picture you in a queue of uniforms,

Five o’clock weeds or stalks of grass in a wasteland,

You’re upside down,

And there are already three stars in your sky.

Squint your eyes, grimace,

And no “Land ho!” from your raft,

You dash your reflection in the water with a direct chop,

And a fourth star lands on your chest,

A deformed plum-like apple.

You turn and follow the queue back to sitting,

Back to waiting,

And names are dryly read from a sheet.







Expiration



A tandem of rubicund xerophytes

Deliquesce into their viscid wig-wam’s,

Rictus, and liken themselves to a lilt.

A riant, auricular cirrus cloud

Commits rhabdomancy toward the diptych,

Embargoes quintessence as hirsute quiche,

Diatomic sassafrassed rhapsody,

Gasworks silo’s ribald gate-legged table,

Disingenuous thread-baring latchet,

Diatribes hedgehop absent cochlea,

To bombast him from wispy existence.





Ten -- Mid-air



No out of body experience

Just my soul plummeting

violently back into my

central nervous system

from

|

mid-air

|

walks

alone with strangers

mechanical dialogue

proving that I'm

the only living soul



mid-air

as if it started to

tug, choke itself,

like a dog on a chain

eager to escape.





respecting your elders


the turbines spin

like lopsided spokes

children screaming

for someone to call them

champ, princess, tyke.

the older kids driving

their pick-ups

oil

sputtering

laughter




Robert Louis Henry lives and studies music in Tennessee. His poetry has appeared in print and electronic magazines such as 3:AM, The Commonline Project, and The Delinquent. A book of poetry, God loves rich kids and we smoke off the same cigarette is forthcoming from Bygawd Books. Robert's co-editor at Leaf Garden Press.