Open mouths hoping for caverns
     move to sigh tokens of triumph
     gifted simply because we tried.

Indeed, the need to matter overcomes
     all lying to combat our heat
     after it’s been bleeding.

Out of us, out of mouths unfit
     for their keeping, pet phrases call;
     culling listeners down to graves
     of grass—unmade beds of followers
     trampled by weeping crowds.

Picture vases holding blades,
     cheapening hurt with choruses;
     wincing glass speaking its last
     in screams to unseen masses
     providential hands pronounce,
     performing unwashed put-downs—
     a shattering which resounds.

Arriving in anatomical cars, bones
     crash like oars into the sitar
     solo flooding our course;
     strung like badges onto undeserving
     bastards, profane pain slaughters
     our sacred calves as we row on.

We coach our Selves to put off touch,
     our desires dissecting rejection’s
     commands we stall: we are the broadcast
     nudes blasting fingers of waves
     into the cunts of the night, so-called.

Off-air, these open mouths hoping
     for providence crawl; out of cribs
     ribbed with gold fillings, we file from west
     of wedlock onto a path beyond
     where fidelity’s parked—pleasure calls.

Falling into prominence, garages
     of garrisoned attendants march up;
     back to the studio they draw us—
     with bayonets into a dark corner
     of nobles sandwiched between
     mayonnaise-skinned, crater-faced teens
     and back-shift, wage-work savages, demanding
     we strip our memories and burn our baggage.