Rain dribbles the guy ropes
from the blue cathedral.
Sound checks compliment
my baby’s feedback reverbs.

Moth-like, a cocoon
musty in blankets,
I tuck woollen wings
into the crib of my folded legs
and rock my son
tense from the fight with sleep.
Stinging with damp,
and sick with the sourness
of beer and grass
fermenting the canvas domes.

I am transfixed
by the flared end of a splif.
The warm orange drifts
like an alien craft between
the smoke ghosted faces of a trinity.
Jesus with dreadlocks to Tolouse Lautrec
to a pierced septum with wolf-man t-shirt
devouring God and Nature.

The seductive scent of them
wraps my blanket closer,
listing men who failed the heat test.

My mater dolorosa fights her femme fatal.

My son’s body feels peaceful.
I sigh into him,
soothed by his sleeping beauty.

Crowds press in behind us.
The Ali Khans come out on stage,
in a celebratory display of patrilineage.
Their sound is a cave of molten gold
feeding a furnace through the base of my chest.

The roof and sky beyond curve above us
in a question mark, doubting
any truth for he and me
on this dismal ledge between worlds of men.


*********

Part 2

Whether one likes it or not
Go with the flow
If the end is good, everything will be good
Up from the depths of misery
In these days friends are won through flattery, the truth gives birth to hate.
From the bottom of the chest.
Man is wolf to man
God and nature do not work together in vain
Here lies.
There is danger in delay.
Fire tests gold; adversity tests strong men
May peace be with you
Sorrowful mother
Avarice is the problem, money itself is not evil.
As you sow, so shall you reap.

************
Stage 1

Nolens volens
Ventis secundis, tene cursum
Si finis bonus est, totum bonum erit
De profundis
Hoc tempore obsequium amicos, veritas odium parit
Ab imo pectore
Lupus est homo homini
Deus et natua non faciunt frusta
Hic jacet sepultus
Periculum in mora
Ignis aurum probat, miseria fortes viros
Pax vobiscum
Mater dolorosa
Radix omnium malorum est cupiditas
Ut sementem feceris, ita metes