Who believed the toads that fell,
swollen,
from his lips?
Provincial parasites in
dilating dystopias,
he whispers—they writhe;
he simpers—they sigh.
And she—
diamonds when she speaks,
pearls when she weeps,
petals when she smiles, and all the while
malachite whorls through a skull forged
for phrenology.
Smooth here, stone there—
fingers probe most secret framework,
scaffolding drafted by destiny.
Bump, lump . . . jump to the whys—
Why me? Why he? Why we?
Let it be.
We shrink: tiny teeth, deflating eyes, contracting tongues,
shrunken heads
spouting toads,
sparking diamonds,
on shoulders far too wide.
YOU ARE READING
Poems for Morbid Children
PoetryThis is a collection of some of my more curious and macabre poems. Many of my poems play with words, the sounds and shapes of them. However, I often attempt to delineate emotion and sensation I cannot otherwise word, or I take inspiration from legen...
