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a phantasmagoria featuring spastic and languid figures in opposition;To Luke Buckham's previous piece     winter's comedianTo Luke Buckham's next piece


extraterritorial triumph

it's the sound of unruly electronic spirits
  scratching fists quiet as blackfly's wings
   in a purpled esophagus
    shining through a bold throat;
tonight this modern gentleman sings himself into hell.

in the attic in the basement in the walls
someone rearranged the wires
 now we can see our statues carved in butter
bathed in the glow that comes
 impossibly from smashed-lamp corners
   with a crackle like a pressure crack's rasp
            in the ice of a frozen lake
your childhood voice recorded
harmonized with breaking waves
plays back on a melting synthesizer
on a lost blue moonlight beach
 covered with discarded medical masks
  leather gloves paint-splattered smocks & flavored condoms
 colors weakened by artificial light
thin ear bones cracked
by memories of unheard atavistic drum music
 a pressure in the ears
  like the flapping of ghost eagle wings
your android hands
your whole face like a frozen rat

I knew joy at 100 mph
as I cracked the rearview mirror with my horrible, perfect eyes
  dropping saxophone note after note
    into a red canyon where lays my bed
and I don't even know how to read music
 I can't detect disease unless my innards punch out
        through my skin like a squeezed lunchbag

   so many gauges
    orange needles filling my eyes
        with wavering dashboard information

you're never supposed to see
your brave dog cower at a gentle knock on your front door
or your priest's eyes filled with complete confusion
you're not supposed to have seen
mom scared shitless
dad walking into a hospital with a heart like an anvil
but you have

and someday you'll laugh at a mere smell
a smell like sulfur mixed with grape wine
that's hell close to your ass on the subway
like a heavy wallet in your back pocket
filled with cancelled credit cards

broken enough to laugh harder than god
happy enough to bend the night sky
 with an erroneous glance at an evil star
I have dumped wine into the strongest river
I have felt my mind pounded into a telekinetic axe
My legs pump like jackhammers through old concrete
My cock still rises like a cartoon shotgun
My words become simple with glee & painful sanity

SORRY THE VOLCANO HAS COOLED
IT'S SACRIFICIAL ALTAR CLOSED PERMANENTLY FOR REPAIRS
PLEASE RETURN DURING OPERATING HOURS
AGAIN & AGAIN & AGAIN & AGAIN.

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