Best Lamprey Poems

The Rhine Salmon Complaint, Translation of Etiemble’s Complainte d’un salmon du Rhin

						For Yvon Belaval
(A lilting musical poem of varying line length in quatrains with a refrain and much internal
 rhyming; end-rhyme scheme: alternate rhymes in succession: abab or in aabb and abba…)

   The...

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They all come, and turn,
The apostatic hundreds from the wilderness,
Hungry as the lamprey, open-mouthed,
Impatient as an itch,
And virtuous as the grave.
Those that wait remain unsatisfied,
Barren children of a barren race,
Yet hopeful ever.
Severed from their mother womb
And ushered into manliness,
The fortunates groan and hate the light
And...

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Sarcomas hatch like caviar
in St. Jude chemo-fire inversions,
where leviathans lay magnetars
to suck the blood of
virgins.

Their celestial suckers nurse their mothers
through quantum-dot tunnels, converging
what little life force
might milk
metastatic roots while purging,

and scute steroids discarding the hair
that ganoid scales like
sturgeon
merging baby dragon parts there
in alternative medicine oceans.

Tumors...

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Every shogun nation wanna be 
in war visor control
Commandeer the missile steering wheel,
be the king of the road

Likewise, imperial power lust eyes
wanna be the top wing of the hive
Taste all the money honey they see ...
rule in monarch luxury as a rogue queen bee

Those choo-choo...

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You were aging by nights.
Days will not seek 
to defend you.

Drawing the landscape 
of a snowfall, 
you will die in a portrait.

The world meets 
you again like a jawless 
lamprey with sucker mouth.

Beyond the blues 
lies a tower, where 
you will not find the stairs.

In...

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Sugar Cain spin speeches
coming from wrinkled, prune faces
Citrus acid tongue leeches
latching on to golden palatial places

Waxy viper lips moving in lamprey motion,
voodoo witches brew is an anaconda potion
Goodwill gestures nod seen tone sourly,
Facial expressions is wink frown candy

Let the people lick the sores of their...

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