A Familial Condition
Disgruntled, they come to me as bit-parts
ripped from black and white movies.
Mad aunt Anastasia, who should have been a nun,
one of her hands would refrain from touching her,
the other has been long carried off
by wolfish priests.
The Holy Ghost has pickled her in a jar,
she now floats between worlds.
Uncle Sean, the iniquitous Maître D'
looming above a meaty cleavage,
he who flambéed Steak Diane
with a slyly sapid leer,
poured cognac,
then after the salacious hunt,
triumphantly decanted his thirsty+ lusts
into any grateful woman
whomever.
Cousin Tommy died early,
but not before he had burnt through
the Old Testament.
A brimstone disorder gnawed his innards,
left him lacking normal human kapok,
kept him bubbling until a self-inflicted wound,
blew out his brains.
There are cousins removed and living,
who disassemble themselves, with zealotry,
or ennui. None took the middle way,
none quietly settled-in
to live a life of unremarkable normality,
trysting the nights away
with damp-stained regrets.
Like larks’ tongues, they sing in the invisible.
They reside in the far reaches,
until dark angels flame out
in their berserker eyes.
Copyright ©
Eric Ashford
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