Hearken! O, Muse—

I’ve of course glimpsed how much
rouge you’ve been using of late.
It confuses me that one so

          beautiful, whom every goddess envies, would

paint her Self with so much
blush when modesty does not become
someone so genius her brilliance rusts

          under that stuff. Kiss it off.

Drop a hand dealt face down
& toss cards pulled, fast for words
until you learn language beggars bards…

                    i.

Pope Mobiles with Sleeping Beauty Queens
doing drive-bys repeating the same mantra
in a single sigh, “Your cock’s

          a secret my pussy can’t keep.”

Virgins turning patience into fragrance, purring
in pouring forth your purest vision
of your best version, your texts

          came in for the kill like

stealth little kisses kamikazeing fatal thrills
on my neck, divine wind of
chills never sent surfacing and sinking

                    ii.

again. Prisoners of war in more
than one sense, imprisoned by duty,
destined to be remanded keeping heavy

          hand tending to captives when we

ourselves are capitve no less, captivating
castaways awaiting new ships to wreck,
wars of which to whisper. When

          whacking off, our rings entangling our

dicks in twisted fists ring as
do castanets, dancing silver bands thrown
against questions none’s fantasies can answer,

                    iii.

wondering which one is next? Cup
of Hymen full of poison, cherish
your flatterers, before the world knows

          it, your pain profits, flourishes, lovers

who die under a tyrant’s sword,
encourages others that by your martyrdom
before, their hearts can soar beyond

          having been sore toward being reborn

tomorrow. Wearing a nest’s worth of
credible threads networking my flesh, unravelled
by your touch’s Calvary charge, sparked

                    iv.

from static to fall off bones
fed on breath, promises inhaled as
if death were generous and what

          end we get worth worrying about

it. Anticipation’s prisons of short sentences,
memories kept in perfect tense, tempo
of the temporal intemperate, inveterate as

          a hermit established in his habit,

he who stands alone after having
been ravished by hands unaccustomed to
not being given into others’ demands.

                    v.

(Learnèd) Fools’ Gallery, Cambridge-style… (Allegèd) Secret
agents and magicians, intellectual intelligence officers-cum-influencers
moonlighting as mathematicians and poets, courtiers

          and couriers of apocalyptic messages… Cryptic

cynics, et cetera… I’ve studied them
all, envisioned their missions’ histories relived
within this obsidian shard beheld in

          my palm, scrying a 5G screen

from behind its lies Five Eyes
fall upon, and even then, sworn
to secrecy, my streamed consciousness wants

                    darkened our blues.