I shall ram pebbles in my mouth
Demosthenes
Not to choke, but half dolphin, half
Shark hammerhead from fathoms deep
Ride the waves to charge the breakers
They erect,
Crush impediments of power and inundate
Their tainted towers –
I shall ram pebbles in my mouth.
I shall place nettles on my tongue
Demosthenes
Then thwart its stung retraction. Oh,
Let it burn at root and roof
Let rashes break from every pore
Just so it sear the tyrant´s power
With one discharge
I shall place nettles on my tongue.
But have you heard of werepe
Demosthenes?
Not all your Stoics´ calm can douse
The fiery hairs of that infernal pod.
It makes a queen run naked to the world
An itch that tells the world its flesh
Is whorish sick –
I shall place werepe on every tongue.
I´ll drop some ratsbane on my tongue
Demosthenes
To bait the rodents with a kiss of death
I´ll seal their fate in tunnels dark and dank
As habitations of their hostages
Denied of air, denied of that same light
Their hands had cupped to immerse their world
I´ll drop some ratsbane on my tongue.
I´ll thrust all fingers down the throay
Demosthenes
To raise a spout of bile to drown the world.
It´s petrified, Demosthenes, mere forms,
Usurp the heaters we knew, mere rasps.
This stuttering does not become the world,
This tongue of millions fugitive from truth –
I´ll let the hemlock pass
Demosthenes
Oh, not between my lip – I´ve shared
Its thin dissolve in myriad throats
At one with that agnostic sage.
They did not stutter like the world they left –
And I know why –
Their lives were spent with heated pebbles
On their tongues, Demosthenes! |
