Carcasses Poems

Naked Greed Meets Raw Power

    Electricity crackles in the air
    roller-coaster careening 
       off its track as silver trumpets blare

    Gangs teem and thrive in jungles 
    from Africa to American streets
        shells of bodies without heartbeats

    Naked greed meets raw power
    each devours the other
         ~ carcasses to recover

Dead End

A random road wanders across the desert
as voluminous clouds chase the rising sun 
nary a sound can be heard, save for the
whipping wind and clicks of insects. 

The yawning horizon stretches out
reaching towards a vast, expansive sea
its crystalline beauty is but a deceptive liar
for death surrounds her ever lapping shores. 

Almost uninhabitable she is
like a barren womb in want
her waters are lifeless, a fluid grave
bearing witness of her desolate decay. 

Fish carcasses tell their solemn tales
along her distant, lonely shores
their bony apertures are splayed and pecked 
hungry seagulls circle, hunting for scraps. 

Relentless winds are spreading littered
whitewashed bones, causing them
to tumble about
conjuring up a false sense of life. 

Now the moon is rising
as acrid air hovers over the sullen sea
the winds seem to shout, “go away”
a dull emptiness prevails. 

The blackest night, save for the moon
descends upon this accursed place
where the bony beach rattles its lifeless tunes
along a haunting shoreline
that no one wants to see
where no one wants to be
beside the Salton Sea. 

Outside The Beltway Thoughts On Chiefs vs Ravens September 5, 2024

Edgar my dear 
Why do you have that spear 
Is that your plan?
When in a jam? 
Scare the bloody Kansas City yellow and red 
When they fight the fowl volture appearing dead 
Spirit Haunting
Spirit Daunting 
Blazing under the Baltimore sun 
Until Poe's poetic message is done
No swift moves will be here 
Only Chiefs carcasses holding their Daly beer

Love Found

Under her hypnotic spell
Leaving me in new realms of emotions.
Where I now dwell

I walk steep hills
Day and night
Up and down 

In my mind

Walking past fast flowing rivers with carcasses of my previous experiences 

With demons from hell

To reach salvation and its soft green meadows of daffodils and crystal clear waters

Such is the power and magnanimity of being under love's spell and being a lone walker

Exploring and worshipping at a new altar
 
(C) Copyright John Duffy

tall Tales

The Meat Locker 

The largest ice freezer of free-range Texan 
long-horns where mice wore fur to survive
broke down, the carcasses began rotting
thrown into the bay.
The day after, sharks came to the surface
throwing up, turning the water foamy 
For anglers, it was a bonus they caught 
big marlins and red snappers 

Mind of Mine

I dread closing my eyes 

Because when I do,

The sane, real world around me dissolves

Replaced instead by an inner monster 

Rising up from the deep dark depths of my mind

I make it sound like I am possessed by a devil

But indeed my mind isn't short of one

Filling me up with raucous laughter

In the most inappropriate of situations

Threatening to tear down the social image of myself

That i have oh so carefully created

So i bow my head down 

In the middle of an ongoing fight or funeral

In solemn silence through eyes of an onlooker

While I am terribly preoccupied waging a war with mind for control : over myself

Not so usually do i win this war of thoughts

My mind a more powerful force than i could reckon

Before i get interrupted by reality

And then this war continues again

In the middle of the night

When my eyes won't close

My mind haunts with memories of the past

Unconquerable dreams of the future

Poking the carcasses of long dead conversations

Rupturing my delicate, unhealed wounds

With knives made of guilt, shame and fear

So on so forth this saga goes on

Until I am left with a battered, ravaged body.

Pan-Africanism

Like twins, we share markers of a common history,
Civilization, and knowledge; a call for unity.
The carcasses of slavery and the slave trade
Are lost in the dust. O black water days.
Colonization has been eaten by our sovereignty.

Our flag, we raise high in the sky.
The struggle for the unification of Africa,
The fight for the liberation of the African people;
To live, strive, and thrive like everyone.
There is only one race; the human race.

Our blood is red; cords of conformity.
The African ancestry is a mighty influence.
Black is gold, black is our identity.
Creamy are our lands; green like the sea.
The glory days need to be fetched.

Let us be the storytellers of our people.
A time to use one powerful currency.
Our honour was never lost but stolen.
Africa is a well, Africa is not a cell.
From here, we provide them with all.

Beautiful, dark people, O Africans.
The merchants no longer come by sea.
Stopping making any form of plea.
As equals or no more dealings.
Africa is for Africans; raise your voice.

With Habakkuk Kargbo (Rabbi)
©Poem Makers SL (18/04/24)

After The Floods

Cracked castles are in dilemma. whether to fall or stand
Waters whirl like a lake and sea, with a lean sign of land.
Among the carcasses of beasts lie humans, as though mixed
In destiny's destructive force, nature remains transfixed.

Swarms of insects strive for existence. Will they all outlast?
Ants carry a dead snakelet in procession, unasked.
Do dogs, cats, goats, and cows think that they're in a swimming pool?
Aren't they on their final journey, though the water is cool?

Blessed are the rescuers, who risk their lives to save others.
To leave one to die or to save them, they have their druthers.
It's due these that the catastrophes of nature get humbled.
The fanfaronade of death and its decay get crumbled

The flood is like autumn. With its waters, it flows and fades.
Doesn’t the drought-flood scene have been enacted like sun and shades?
Vegetation sprouts with renewed vigour, power and strength.
Meadows, orchids, and orchards spread out to an unseen length.

Trail

In the land we stay, from a time best forgotten
A single trail was blazed with hope
For those who seeked it, and those who needed most
It brought the only absolution, the only life
in a defected soul.

Despite the Fatherly intention, it was best taken with a layer of soot:
Flock carcasses, rotten, still stared back
Waste, its copper smell, stamped a curse for all that’s gone
And, at every step
parasites ate their way right through one’s meat;
Still yet, it wasn’t the worst that could come.

It took less than a day for it all to be gone
Hidden under layers of dust
But not of sand, such as those spread by thunder
Like it did so many times
But with soil dumped from machinstic wonders
And the Tsar’s wicked hands.

Scenic Views

Written: August 22, 2023
________________________________________________________________

whispers of the past
rusty carcasses stand tall~
tales lost to the waves

the leafless tree stretch
birdhouse waddle in the breeze~
sanctuary high

beauteous full moon
shines brightly for us to see~
promises unfold

chilled birds find solace
kind heart, a thoughtful gesture~
incessant snow falls

Abandoned Tableau

Abandoned at sea,

dismantled, wasted-

carcasses of ships

join the huge graveyard

on Shipwreck Beach shore-

battling waves no more.

Wrecked Ships Tableau

Rusty carcasses,
forsaken by time,
battered by wind, waves.
Once useful and proud,
now broken, forlorn.
The tales they could tell.

#1

Summertime

Summer is the season that brings forth buds and blooms,
When every hill and vale in green livery, clad,
When the busy bee around opening flower zooms,
And stray clouds in the blue-sky roam so glad.

It is the time when grasshoppers vault on silky grass, 
When every blade and leaf at dawn sparkles with dew,
When black ants move with tiny carcasses en masse,
And ladybirds dance in frocks of black and red hue.

When on breezy evenings children set out to play,
And men go for angling in babbling brooks.
When farmers after the harvest dry their hay.
And sunbeams weave patterns even in forest nooks.

But summertime pleasantly cool in the evenings can turn,
Sultry at noon when lacerating rays come down to burn!

A Sailor's Lie

Wistful falls the shadow of a fading moon
’neath its flowing robe of melancholy
Lurk skeletons of love’s affairs undone
Salted carcasses of long withered souls

Grim sands ever deepening depression
Swallowing the vessels scant remains
Soon to deny loves eerie presence
Muffled in surf’s windblown shroud

Some say they see the gloomy spectre
Sense the emptiness of tattered sails
Soft billowing of love’s pure kiss withdrawn
Aground upon the battered rocks of feelings

And yet the lover’s haunt the tortured coastline
As breaking waves erase a sailor’s lie.

I Have Seen Them

I have seen them
Near the distant bush
Shriveled carcasses
Slightly gnawed
Partly “eaten”.
I have not seen - “IT”
And worry
About “IT’s”
Dining habits.

John G. Lawless
©5/23/2023

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