Butterfly

Dripping mucus,
From a dry branch in the
Dim moonlight,
Hardens around undeveloped wings,
Pale and transparent in hue,
In the first stages of decay.

Slowly,
Gently to the beat of a non-existent drum –
Atrophied muscles twitch and pulse
And the cocoon fluctuates,
Glowing slightly.

No sound is made
As the fragile shell cracks
And splinters,
Pushing the creature through
And propelling it to the ground.

It remains motionless now.
Not a twitch, not a pulse –
Almost as if it were stillborn.
Hours pass,
And...

With a rush of the drowned
That now draws breath,
Destroyed wings flutter wildly –
Somehow.
And the silence is broken
As the dead butterfly struggles
To take to the air.

Shadows draw in
To consume it once more,
But it pushes past –
Finding freedom in the sky.

Underwater Storm

Black gold runs through pipelines. Arteries,
Food for a bloodthirsty race.
Light us up, push us forth...
Keep us warm.
Burning away.

Dive with me.
Dive with the fire from a broken drill,
Rushing through the veins.
Cracks form as it throws me back,
And the flames begin to snarl.

The cracks, they bleed.
First a trickle, now in torrents –
A black, dead river rushing into the sea,
As the smoke chokes the reddening sunrise –
Pulling back the night.

Eyes stinging, I manage to hack out
Ragged coughs, as I stagger to the edge.
Bruised and sore hands collide
With warming metal,
As I watch the slippery, viscous cloud spread –
Hidden by arrogant officials.
They don't believe it's there.

A Gannet spots a fish shimmer... briefly,
Now obscured as the wet shadow consumes it.
A splash, as the bird dives – hungered.
It does not resurface.

Struggling weakly, a mangled thing floats away,
Splattered in a dark slime.
Trying to fly away, it fails –
Movements choked by the blanketing liquid
That spreads through the sea.

Politicians flail,
Huddled in a cool, air-conditioned room,
Calm voices discuss.
Futile ways to stop the spill,
Cheap methods to save the day
And preserve their glorified image.
As fish and sea-bound avian drift –
Encased in an oily sheen,
A lonely structure burns and bleeds...

Night falls.
Limply I slip over the edge,
Crashing into the layered sea.
Glancing up – a beacon sears the sky,
A certainty of mistakes recreated.

The dark tendrils clasp my legs,
Pulling down.
Blindfolded, lungs invaded,
It pulls me –
And I sink...

Distracted

It's a time when many
Look to distractions, and sleep;
Long-ago films flashing on a dark plastic box...

And here I sit by the window,
Head against glass.
The sun has long fallen
To distant hills, letting me be –
With nothing but a dim reflection to talk to.
Owls call faintly in the distance,
And wires are invisible to the dark landscape –
But for a wooden pole,
Standing out against the sky.

Books of science lie forgotten at my feet –
Lifts, rockets, stringed tensions...
And Newton's well-remembered laws.
Dying songbirds call to the imagination –
A story halfway told.

Yet I am so... distracted.
The trivialities of books are gone from my mind,
Instead taken by a sleeping landscape
Far away from fume-choked roads.
Discarded phones and not-quite-dead shrieks
Hide below the floor.

Trying to pass time
By suppressing fears about oncoming tests;
Music notes flicker in my mind.
Eyes itch with slight fatigue –

But I still can't sleep.

Moonrise

Twilight darkens,
And you illuminate
In the wake of the coming midnight.
The stars, in their distant glory,
Come and play at your feet.
Innocent eyes dance, alive with glee
As you arise.

The soft luminance
Cools my skin.
Envelops and caresses –
A sun-kissed lover coming in close,
Whispers at my ear.
Comforting lullaby of light
Kisses me to sleep.

The insane will scream
At your cool, round presence –
Their hysterics will ricochet off the walls,
Echoing dimly in the darkness.
Whilst the wolf will sing,
Fur rippling in the pale moonlight.

The songs mix with the screams,
A symphonic undertone of the night.
The melody of the full moon.

And I watch
From the window,
As you hang silently in the indigo sky.
As the clock begins to call
In the distant quiet.

While I retreated into the shadows,
You remained.
Oblivious
In the light of your evanescent glow.

A Pre-Spring Dawn

Dark leaves shiver
In the cooling wind,
Trembling as it caresses
Their fragile membranes.
Leaving a soft teasing of warmth.

Sleeping flowers stir,
Curled up in their protective shell
As they grow. Regenerate.
Too early to play, they let the breeze pass
And slumber on.

On the damp, rain-fresh grass,
Wet loam perfumes the air.
Sparrows dart across the green blades,
Snatching their morning feed,
Shooting past us as we lie on the lawn,
Letting the morning shower soak into our backs.

Like a fairy, the wind kissed your face,
And you giggled
As invisible wings tickled your skin.
Sounds dancing on air,
Like your soft, child-like laughter.
It makes me forget everything
As we watch the sunrise,
Tearing the sky open with its light.

The glow catches
In the dark pools of your eyes,
Shimmering gently.
No more sound - we just watch
As the dawn clears the sky.

Fae Spectra

Dark nights under a starry sky,
As she sings beneath the eternity moon.
Tears of her song echo
Across shattered screams.
The remnants of a chaotic smile.

Silvery emeralds shimmer quietly
In the distance of this jagged ravine.
She stands alone, a dead wind in her hair –
A form half flesh, half skeleton.

Her simple beauty fades
Into the insane grin of Bone.
Black eyes turn blacker,
And become empty.
A dull whiteness glimmers wetly
In shallow moonlight –
It juts from her.
Sharp knives in dark cavities.

The eggs fly from her hands
As she lets them free,
Tossing them towards the glassy greens.
They near their target... and disintegrate
In a burst of bright light.
From which a bird will glide,
Calling to the sky.
Its ash drifts to the floor.

It swirls around this winged girl –
One side feather soft, the other ragged and torn.
The dust dances before her face,
Choking her as she continues.

Amnesia of Days

Forget.
Everything steps back -
Mists and liquefies.
Blurry faces. Pixelled days.
They fall away.

Forgot-them-not flowers grow around
Beneath me, so comforting.
The days forgot.
They’ve forgotten me,
An amnesia, not my own.

Hours shatter.
The seconds flurry,
Fleeting little butterflies that dance…
Dance, and slowly
Fade away.

Scatter down
Into that ravine.
I stand alone,
Watching the fragments fly free.
At the edge, I stand
And wait to fall.
It calls to me.

But when I answer,
And join myself
With those forgetful days…
Remember me.
In freefall, flying through the air.
I will never leave.