vigilante

 

by Iain Britton

 

 

 

 

1

 

a swirling white anatomy

 

    comes fondling

 

              partially asphyxiating

 

this vigilante alert on hard ground

 

 

2

 

the uninvited

shuffle about me

                           jostle like llamas

                        behave like llamas

 

my directive is one of interference

 

i steal images from their mouths

 

           slide deliberately between individuals

 

               zoom in on sun damage

 

                              skin fur /     moles /        botoxed layers

 

the rain presses against the windows

 

             dampness clings /      this

 

 

3

 

     summer clings

 

i’m alert to the slightest mood swing

 

                these people seem intent on

                                                     

strengthening their brotherhood

 

they bristle and shout

 

              so many gods

 

      so many pulses

 

                         so many

 

                who want to fire at will

 

 

    they live for skating across

 

                                    the moon’s black mirrors

 

                they take only a few personal possessions ...

 

go with their deities

 

flashing their forked tongues

 

 their eyes

 

 

4

 

i drink            from the sky’s deep trough

 

              a fresh perception

 

 

the uninvited

 

                 trespass on

 

         this vigilante’s

 

            bruised dugout in the clay

 

they herd together /           uncertain / excited

 

they feel pulses

 

the war throb in bellies

 

           some leap off cliffs

 

           of collapsed rock

 

     still fighting

 

 

         epicureans

 

                   party long into the summer’s midnight

 

 

               i snatch

 

                    keepsakes for preservation

 

 

5

 

my purpose

 

            has a lot to do

            with the nocturnal

            activities of the fat lady

 

who laughs cries sells night-club fantasies to comrades-in-arms

who crawl into beds in boxes or under bridges or between flaxes

who snuck under newspaper tents avoid the religious popes and

babblers the christ childs growing up overnight left choosing

timbers for the rest of us to be privileged amongst thieves / to say

that we were there  / had been there with the skinny man who sings

                                 loudest longest is enough

 

               i steal

 

                    from the living            and

 

as real as happily ever after might be

 

         icons preserved in condoms

 

take pride of place

 

give pleasure

 

 

a tactile legacy

 

perpetuated by the silhouette of a stork

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Iain Britton is online at IainBritton.co.nz.