Extravegance was Once a Sin

That's right
extravagance was once a sin
your big TV was not a venial sin
atoned for by easy sacraments
No, it was one of the mortal sins
Image each turbo sports coupe
carrying a demonic destroyer of grace
storm clouds gathering over FAO Schwartz
a tempest beset each person exiting the building
once upon a time, the faithful wore hair shirts
as a symbol of earnest devotion
having forsaken luxury and embracing the death of baptism
the wanted to be uncomfortable in their cloths
a constant reminder that their desire belonged
in another plan of existence
now the devout purchase glass cathedrals and gold crosses
wrapped in modern fashion from head the foot
no one ever need wash a brother's feet
nor dry them with their hair
all of the obvious stories of faith
seem to be in the past
now they are so subtle and sly that they are wasted
on the children of cinematic imaginations

Lust, Oddly is Not Listed in Proverbs 6

She was so pretty
when she was younger
that is the way to the end
and then the eye is hooked
by desirous form
the way the monk breaks his vow
and catches a carp barehanded

but there is more to it
it is not for love of form
that the married stray
there is so much loss of self
as one progresses towards death
a loss of purpose and future
an inability to pour desire
into the crevasse of every moment
living as a carapace discarded by time
we are deafened by the drone
of routine,
of competence,
of familiarity
it is hollow and we weep
there is nothing left for us to feel
deeply down in the core

and then the devil walks in
a compliment a smile
a light touch on the wrist
a word whispered throaty and warm
lead down by an illusion of self
lead down by a longing for
for what? for sex? not exactly
damned by one last opportunity
to dream once again of defining
this life in new illustrious terms
to throw off the shackles of a
worn and thoroughly familiar domesticity
with its easy charms and simple peace
this is not what we pictured as our legacy
instead we want to embrace everything
alive and voluminous and unreal
so strong the desire for potentiality
we are lead of the precipice with out even a whimper
and even a pockmarked husk of desire
left over from a thousand dull carcasses
can seem like the last thread of hope
of youth and of fortune
and holding on double fisted tight
it severs and you fall
a wasted body
whipped down hard
into the rocks

The Iconograghy of Death Gods

Sails of trade brought Shinigami
death gods stridently crawling
across the islands of Japan
an exogenous agent to explain
the decay or feudal morality

The Reaper lives with us as a hood
a ragged robe and knurled hands
darkened by his work as a hard honest plague
apart from the human hands that sew it
forcefully detaching death from our bosom

Apollyon has a rotten job, for an angel
a curse to humanity resulting
from the folly of human character
daily awash in that which is
deadly sin for mortal hands
I bet none of the other angels
will eat with him in the celestial cafeteria

Atop pyramids warriors were given
obsidian wounds to appease the gods
who, hunkered down on their scaly torsos
feathers draped over the clouds
peer at us with sanguine stares

This fear this crime reigns over us
our minds and spirits quaver as
releasing our tenuous grip
on the shadowy things we know
we migrate to an immutable other