Grapes

 

Image from pinterest.com

 

give the falcon its wing

starlings scatter in bursts

across blue vineyard skies

the grape unmolested

reclines into ripening

safe in its succulence

peacefully purpling

sweet with maturity

leaving the felons

the plumed iridescent

escaped murmuration

to seek a new roost

for rapacious designs

fear of strength

and its consequence

once again proven

the gentlest of weapons

Arma Christi

 

Sculpture by Janina Karczewska-Konieczna

 

 

the thorn and the nail
weapons primitive cruel
not enough to hang death
life must end in great pain
know the punishment
earned by its insolent birth

the lance and the sponge
deliver unkind mock relief
blood and water drawn
merciless staining faith’s
rough-hewn conjectures of
dogwood and cedar and pine

the veil and the shroud
timeless moments of stillness
one before and one after
the passion the end
the beginning the cup
of shed blood yet among us

the symbols the icons
these heraldic arms
weapons wielded against
force of darkness by
contradict everlast light
cast by man’s prince of peace

The Somme

“Trenches” by Otto Dix

(Originally posted here February 2014)
 

coarse soliloquies silently
scraped at those thoughts
still alive in the trenches
regimental regalia lay muted
by phosgene and field guns
a million bones melted
down into the farmlands
of barbed wire watershed
wounded by tank treads
and howitzer wheels leaving
permanent scars and
perpetual echoes of thunder
in dreams of a continent
destined for more cataclysmic
ordeals modern legacies
fruiting political genes since
first seeded by clans in the
bronze age who realized
new tactical purpose
for murderous blades

Warrior

“The Weatherman” by Max Ernst

 

fighting for what
in the end
seems so useless
what good is it
living
this living
in warfare
against my own body
what point is there
climbing through pain
reaching
only more pain
why assault him
with poison
intending
to strangle this foe
who won’t die
who keeps coming
and coming
attacking
the quiet
as well as the noise
under merciless
moons and white
pitiless suns
no avail of relief
to be drawn
from the indifferent
movements
by hands of
the clock

I can thrash him
with words
on a page
give him battleax
blows with the
blade of a pen
that at least
give some sense
of revenge
intellectual payback
without any
victory
merely the
honor of warriors
giving
as good as they get
with the last
and the least
of my arsenal
verse
bent and tortured
by siege
that a decade ago
broke through doors
of the gunroom
that once armed
my mind

Ingenium

Atlatl

 

slender leverage
on deadly ballistic darts
could fell mastodons

Resolution

Wrecking Ball
Photo from heraldsun.com.au

truth is a weapon
raining destruction
on citadels built
from bad bones
standing meanly
false cultures
belief systems
stubbornly errant
inculcate with lies

Drones

Drone
Photo by Reuters
From washingtonpost.com

eyes buzz desert air
hunting camouflaged malice
lethal vigilance

Bowie’s Knife

Photo from mileswelze.com

smithed in a fiery
frontiersman forge
honed to bear-skinning edge
along broadblade duality
Arkansas toothpick
point drawn deadly sharp
turned trailblazer tool
to wicked formidable
wilderness weapon

slashed violent legend
across savage lands
cut to even the odds
in that sandbar fight
under Vidalia
dispatched three assassins
back home amid stirred
rise of armed revolution
by bold restive Texans
then died a proud
iron willed death
clutched defiantly
inside the Alamo walls

but its scions survived
in tooled leather sheaths
strapped on hard living legs
of the hard dying soldiers
of fortune and fortitude
carving the routes
of a bloodlust expansion
that chased Spanish rule
from unstoppable destiny

Scimitar

Illustration from
commons.wikimedia.org

 

 

edged with a backcurve

evoking a moon hung

in crescentic phase

symbolic of war

masquerading as peace

shaped for the slash

horseback histories

and executioners

fit to infidel necks