Alchemisland

A portly pillar of spilled teeth moonlight ensorcelled the crane-tattooed water

Overhead, impossible butter light from brotherless stars snuffed out in antient time

Without as much as a snarl, yet every night they are restarted from death

Love and oblivion twinned in the wind-worn idol of Astarte

In the lane abutting, cardboard alight in a barrel illumines a harrowed figure

But how like a hallowed when transfigured to words, bearded and wild-eyed

Lowly and thereby holy, earth-bathed; more assured and certain of evil works

More assertive, as the streets rarely give lightly what one deserves

Things taken are rarely followed by divine smiting or justice, just desserts

It never goes away, yet lessens how much it hurts

I watched skittering stars hurtling past what acid throb made out as Mars

There, beside swans so stained their necks resembled greenbottles

There, by barges and rats with gnashers of remarkable largeness and where 

Revellers can be throttled or stabbed with broken bottles, by junkies and madmen.