What did we raze for these serpent roads
to roll as armoured beasts
to what slain saints of the underworld do we owe our gratitude
as we crawl as great hulks
through the mist of our every herds breath
traffic lights, the storytellers to this entity as one
as we blink our hooded eyes out of the sun
this long, long beast a dragons tail, serpentine
roars with impatient voices
waiting, longing, straining
for the emeralds.
Author: Matt
Humour me more of my letters from Mammaroon
Dear, Friends
Another letter in such quick succession! I know! But there is much more to report on, dear friends!
I must be going crazy! There is no other explanation!
I awoke today to find that the mannequins were no longer standing hand in hand. I initially thought they were nowhere to be seen in my sleepy haze! Till I opened my bleary eyes further, looked around me, and realised that they were now lying down, each mostly submerged in the sand but for their knees jutting out. One had its legs spread open, the one I had drunk from the other day; the hole was visible as if trying to entice me. The other one, whom I had never seen the front of, as I never dared go near where they stood, as there was an ominous energy about them, had a phallic-like column jutting out of the sand. Yes, You read that right!
At first, I didn’t have the energy or wherewithal to think anything more about it. Frankly, my skin was itchy and sore, my lips sore and dry, and my stomach aching so I rolled over and started to doze again.
When I came to again, I looked back at the Mannequins, who were still lying in the same position. It was then I noticed some sand had since blown off their torsos, and I could see little beads of sweat on their chests. I crawled and slid across the sand, parched as I was. The journey towards them felt like it had taken forever, and it had taken me a while.
I curled up next the mannequins and went back into a hazy sleep.
When I awoke, I painfully crawled closer and started licking at the little beads of mannequin ‘sweat’ with a great thirst.
‘Oh, thank you!’ I found myself saying, ‘I need this!’ I said, every bead tasting like heaven to my tongue. I followed the mannequin’s body with my tongue till I reached under its knees, and then I was between the legs and licking up any moisture I could.
It hadn’t occurred to me, Dear friend, in my thirsty haste what this looked like! I was just so glad of any water! No matter how little the baubles!
But as I reached closer to the hole, a thought startled me!
‘No!’ I shouted or instead tried to shout from my wretched throat, ‘No, I will not!’ I felt my nails dig into the sore skin of my hands as I made fists. ‘Fuck you!’
See, it had occurred to me that this was what they wanted; this was what they were counting on! They were breeding from me! They were trying to get my sperm! I know how crazy that sounds, but is that so crazy after all I’ve told you? Alice and my daughter flashed into my mind, and it all made sense. They’re using me to breed!
Then, another horrifying thought entered my head, does this mean, dear friends, you no longer exist? Are we near extinction? Were trying to conserve us, using me? Am I the last man alive?
No. No. No.
No, I will not have it! If that is so, I shall die here. I shall die out, and I shall not be giving them anything of mine!
Yours faithfully,
Holden Mcgroin.
Author’s note: I think these letters have essentially become my creative outlet for writing practice. They’re hit and miss, but I’m sharing them anyway.
Cannibal
There is white noise
beaming from your teeth
As we become ground meat
smeared against your cannibalistic grin
all the hate you shape
We only taste good after you’ve driven us insane
It’s like I said…
The dead eat the living
and come alive again
so wilt away
and fall as petals do
The abyss is only as deep as you dig
It’s like I said
The world will eat us and all our friends.
A violent heart
Smugness has sculpted your face into a permanent sneer
It’s fascinating
I can’t bear it
Sometimes I want to punch you, rearrange your face
I know it’s violence for violence’s sake, I’m afraid
You bring out the worst in me
Though sometimes I doubt it’s not for the greater good
Doesn’t it show that inside of me is a thumping heart?
And what better way to feed it’s hunger
than being on the lookout for blood?
Primal Heart
The sunrays spangled
through the human debris
plastic
ensared on the branches of a tree
flailing in the breeze
playing trickery in the shadows
make it appear like flights of fancy
but then a Blackbird
dino skitters along the fence
It makes me imagine a velociraptor
and his shadow plays on my wall
and I think that’s what I’m missing
something primal, primitive
My heart beats for it
though overcome by the fear of it
but the fear itself uncivilising me
Thus, wild I am becoming
Sunday Wordle 4th May: Hobsons choice
Letters from another planet: The Mammaroon letters
Dear friends,
I doubt these letters get to you; it’s all wishful thinking on my part. Alas, I shall write anyway as Sisyphus would, right?
I have since been taken out of the fish tank-like home again and, this time, placed on a desolate planet. Well, I can only assume it’s a planet. A never-ending ocean of sand surrounds me, and the heat from two suns bears down on me; it’s unbearable.
I have sunburn and blisters galore all over my skin.
The only company I have is two mannequins; they stand hand in hand, ivory coloured, with the suns beaming down on their bald heads. Sometimes, the suns shine from such an angle that it blinds me to look at their heads.
I don’t know if this is a punishment and, if so, what it would be for.
I go in and out of delirium, and I’ve had many a moment where I think up a sordid joke inside my head, and a tumbleweed rolls past as if the world has read my fragmented mind and I’ve become the butt of the planet’s irony.
I have seen no other living thing, though sometimes I could swear the mannequins are watching me. I swear that sometimes they move; I have seen them lift a hand and wave at me!
One day, I awoke to find only one mannequin standing in place, the sand heaping around its feet, and when I turned around, the other one stood inches away from me. Between its legs was a hole, and water started to gush forth from it. I knelt underneath and let that water pour, lappin it up with a ferocious thirst. The mannequin returned to its previous spot next to the other, and again, they stood hand in hand.
‘You’re alive!’ I shouted toward them, ‘Come! I need more water!’ I bellowed. But they stood stock still as if neither had ever moved before.
I don’t know what else to say right now, so I shall leave this here.
Yours faithfully,
Holden Mcgroin.
P.S. I must amend my first observation that no other living thing is here with me because since I first wrote this letter, I have seen those little boobacious spiders falling from the purpled night sky. And, my, what a sight they were! And a sight they’ve left behind!
They glowed as if bioluminescent, something I had never observed in the boobacious species before. The purpled sky lit up turquoise like that plankton you have in the ocean on Earth!
The boobacious spiders fell to the sand and crawled in stop and start jerks, before riding their webs back up into the sky and slowly one by one the turquoise disappeared.
But now, in the sky, a tapestry of silk has been left behind and sometimes baubles of dew sparkle before dropping into the sand.
I don’t know what any of this means. Maybe I’m hallucinating the whole damn thing at this point.
Flesh
I don’t know why; I picture us under red light
as we become entwined under the sheets
I’ve seen films trying to be poetry
bending light in such ways
as to allow the viewer to possess beauty
but I want to bear you
while you seize me as your own territory
Perhaps the red light is a symbol of the blood that runs in moments like this
the rivers we run through
to be taken or take another
always trying to claw back to that feeling
of something primal, something more than human
that animal within us
when we need something
more akin to murder
perhaps like fucking
where nothing is more tender
than the meeting of flesh and bone
silverbackgorillapoetry.com 