The Death of One Who Never Was

He or sometimes She
would never feel the salt but still we mourn
as if She or sometimes He
had lived a thousand lives.

All pains lie with Him
or Her,
the bullets and heartache,
ills and poisoned luck.

So here's to you
as tongueless hoardes come mute
to sail heavy, sometimes awkward glances
over thy dark frame in sandy, morphine jaws.
Eyes closed yet alive to clocks
and inches,
rolling to tea and shop fronts
where memoirs dragged by chariots of ages
come to fall under sleepy overtures
and choirs of death.

You,
the friend to skulls
lover of gin gallows and looking to the blind,
you come to a hundred deaths.

@Steven Francis poems 2014

I Pick My Nose When God is Watching

No pews here squire,
the dotcom boys hid them
under vomit flavoured Gucci cases,
where squalid beggars are refused alms.
Clutcher, get a clutcher quick,
bang that breathing muscle in your bulls-eye
and drop off to where charity
is always in season.

Alas thought occurs -
tattooed sleeves
always stroke veneered souls.

Classy old male
(Messiah junior)
pardon me and do-re-me,
young champions of the silver set.
Never mind the rag hearts,
made to burn
and soak up fat from sunset elders,
die young is a privilege.

All hail opportunity!

©Steven Francis poems 2013

Laughs Out Allowed

Werewolf lord with shipwrecked smile
know that there is no humour in vanity,
no mirth in easy offence
so drop the mule act
and find a style of YOURS not THEM.

No to God.
No to copyright.
No to Gossip, Kings and Love
(all capitals),
but fret not ham diamond Buddha.
The words in this stanza
do not apply to you my would-be hero...

©Steven Francis poems 2013