Darkness and the Shadow of Light


I

I feel like a statue of an armless angel
Broken; hurt
Flawed at my very core,
Rage jets thru my veins, a
Black blood poison
Hot with fury
It rolls off me like smoke, like
Sad music
My soul rises up from the
Red sky of the west
A fiery chariot amassed of
Iron; steel:
Engine parts
Bones, both human and animal
With a hideous velocity I
Scream across the heavens,
Washing the countryside in
A sick sweet death like some
Monstrous plague
Anger boils over me in a
Screaming rain and
I want to destroy everything;
If I were God everything
Would die a slow; horrific
Death

II

I look at my arms.
There are spiders in my veins,
they are glossy blue-black:
The color of sin, the color
Of a waxed Porsche.
The crimson hourglasses on their backs
Shine like Christmas tree decorations
The spiders mate, they fuck
In my blood
Discharging a sick dead venom
That dozes up and down my
Arteries
Eating at the last innocence
Of my soul
To live, I must release them
With trembling fingers
I pick up a straight razor,
Its rusted serrated edge like
The fringe of a shadow
The razor needs soft flesh
Like a dozen red roses I
Give the gift of freedom to the
Spiders:
A rush of blood, down my
Forearm
An alizarin crimson curtain
Rising, like my soul, to
Signal the start of the end
Who will be the slave to
The spiders,
Now?


- James O'Barr