Two Poems: ‘Melting’ & ‘Robot’

Jon Stone

August 25, 2014

Melting

Meet me round the campfire in a while,
after all the bruisy storms and the high rises
turned to hollow rasps, the lowlands souped,
the roads scabbed.

You’ll be sleeping gently and I’ll know you
by your lurid exterior,
as I know the humboldt squid,
the abandoned arcade.

I’ll be gloomy, so gloomy.
The wind does this to me.

Your most will be
mudslide,
flesh an ill-fitting costume
or three, slung on
an outpost of bone.
Find you
in a rain-rinsed socket,
macerating h
azily,
friends all about you.

Prickled by sunshine,
lanced by headlamp,
the wind, the wind com
ing through me.
An itch is too much, a song is too

much,
and gloomy,
so gloomy.

Love you for
your face that
molluscs
into the gulch of your

neck,
your lip

that bubbles,

the kissed scar that lowers
on a sy
rup
of muscle

to a
stirruped hip.

Love you for
your    loins
looping at my

feet

but don’t
don’t
d
on’t
be gloomy like

I’m

gloomy

but

be
pink
honey.

 

---

Robot

Hey robot, your cackling strut, your striking out
6f 6e 62 6c 69 73 74 65 72 65 64 72 6f 61 64onblisteredroad
can be caught by any cockled ear
66 72 6f 6d 68 65 72 65fromhere
to kingdom come, so come dust-burnished
62 72 69 67 68 74 68 75 6e 67 72 79brighthungry
and scuttle between pocked ventifacts
66 6c 69 63 6b 65 72 69 6e 67 6c 79flickeringly
Take your teeth to locked chests
62 6c 6f 6f 64 2d 63 61 6b 65 64blood-caked
and gorge on spilled armaments
73 65 6d 69 61 75 74 6f 6d 61 74 69 63 73semiautomatics
swallow grip, hammer and firing pin
6d 75 7a 7a 6c 65 63 61 72 74 72 69 64 67 65muzzlecartridge
but let them learn
6c 65 74 6d 65 6c 6f 76 65letmelove
the taste of your fricative tic, your sibilant hiss
79 6f 75 72 6b 69 6c 6c 73 74 72 65 61 6byourkillstreak
You’ve got them licked, you pig of tin
79 6f 75 62 75 6c 6c 65 74youbullet
You’re all pluck.